Maw Irregular Fleet versus the United Federation of Planets

[The Romulan Republic]

Given that the ship Daala's fleet is based on is the Chimaera aka Thrawn's old flagship, there is no reason why the two fleets should even fight. If there are any loyalist crew members they will just as well defect to Thrawn, especially since he offers far more than Daala could in such a scenario. Alternatively, Thrawn may very well know how to manipulate the Chimaera's computers or something.

Excellent point. So, Thrawn's old friends on the Chimaera stage a mutiny and join him, perhaps supported by some hacking from Thrawn. Thrawn wins.

As to the rest, an asymmetrical campaign might work, but there is no way the UFP will ever consent to such a campaign due to the scale of slaughter. There is no way for Thrawn to take any of the ships out in a standup fight.

The idea that the Federation are pussies who will surrender at the first sign of heavy casualties is an exaggeration of TNG's pacifist ideals that's not really supported by canon. Didn't Deep Space 9 predict 900 billion casualties in the Dominion War before the Federation surrendered? Yeah, the Federation will surrender the first time a world gets bombarded.

Frankly, even if the Federation government surrendered, there are elements that would ignore such a surrender. Some of the Starfleet officers, almost certainly, and probably most people who used to be in the Bajoran resistance. Fighting a massively superior foe with little regard for civilian deaths is business as usual to them.

[Thanas]

The idea that the Federation are pussies who will surrender at the first sign of heavy casualties is an exaggeration of TNG's pacifist ideals that's not really supported by canon. Didn't Deep Space 9 predict 900 billion casualties in the Dominion War before the Federation surrendered? Yeah, the Federation will surrender the first time a world gets bombarded.

Bad Argument. With Daala being able to completely destroy every federation world in a few days and there is nothing anybody can do against that this scale is a completely different one. If the Federation would win such a war it would be worse than the Dark Ages simply because there will be no civilization as such that still exists.

Frankly, even if the Federation government surrendered, there are elements that would ignore such a surrender. Some of the Starfleet officers, almost certainly, and probably most people who used to be in the Bajoran resistance. Fighting a massively superior foe with little regard for civilian deaths is business as usual to them.

Yes, which is why those would probably be the ones Thrawn would rely on. But not even the Japanese fought on after having a mere two cities destroyed by nuclear bombs. Are you honestly saying the Federation is more cynical and has less regard for civilian life than the Japanese Empire?

[Eternal_Freedom]

There's a difference between a predicted 900 billion death toll, that's predicted by people you inherently do not trust, and actually suffering those losses as core worlds like Earth, Vulcan and Andor are levelled.

[StarSword]

At y'all's request, I'm taking the mini-debate with Danny to PMs.

The modified torpedo being guided was a moderately important plot element in TUC you know but yeah, photorps visibly acting like homing weapon is pretty rare (I think D13 mentioned a TNG episode where they also did last time I brought this up and I think it happened a few times in DS9, but don't ask me for specifics).

I've only seen movies 3, 7, 8, 10, and 11, so I wasn't aware of this incident. I'll defer to your expertise here.

I am personally aware of Kirk using a self-guided torp against a D7 in the book Federation, but that ain't canon.

Yes, which is why those would probably be the ones Thrawn would rely on. But not even the Japanese fought on after having a mere two cities destroyed by nuclear bombs. Are you honestly saying the Federation is more cynical and has less regard for civilian life than the Japanese Empire?

They leave civilians aboard starships during combat, don't they? Just saying.

[Thanas]

They leave civilians aboard starships during combat, don't they? Just saying.

This is not an attempt at a serious argument, right?

[The Romulan Republic]

Bad Argument. With Daala being able to completely destroy every federation world in a few days and there is nothing anybody can do against that this scale is a completely different one. If the Federation would win such a war it would be worse than the Dark Ages simply because there will be no civilization as such that still exists.

The Federation has officers with enough balls to defy Q (or punch him in the face). Courage and determination in the face of impossible odds are almost a defining characteristic of Starfleet.

Yes, which is why those would probably be the ones Thrawn would rely on. But not even the Japanese fought on after having a mere two cities destroyed by nuclear bombs. Are you honestly saying the Federation is more cynical and has less regard for civilian life than the Japanese Empire?

I'm merely noting that according to canon they are apparently willing to suffer 900 billion casualties. Ie, over 100 times the population of the entire Earth today. If you take issue with that, your complaint is with the DS9 writers, not me.

Now, Eternal_Freedom is right to call into question the accuracy of those projections, but unless they are off by a very wide margin, the Federation will not surrender easily. I could also point to the long tradition of Starfleet officers willing to self-destruct their vessels and defy nigh-omnipotent beings rather than give in.

[Thanas]

The Federation has officers with enough balls to defy Q (or punch him in the face). Courage and determination in the face of impossible odds are almost a defining characteristic of Starfleet.

Of some officers of Starfleet, who neither set Federation policy and are notorious for disobeying it. This reflects how on the ability of the Federation?

I'm merely noting that according to canon they are apparently willing to suffer 900 billion casualties. Ie, over 100 times the population of the entire Earth today. If you take issue with that, your complaint is with the DS9 writers, not me.

Who says the Federation leadership ever got those projections? And it really does not matter if they surrender or not. They will lose all their worlds and all their civilian base. Whatever survives of the Federation will be a tiny mass of ships trying to hide and wage a guerilla war.

You tell me if the Federation is willing to sacrifice 99% of their civilians on the very small chance that they might win a guerilla war after which their society will either resemble a military dictatorship or just break down.

[Stark]

Even worse, xyz casualties over five years (or whatever the timeframe was) is a different thing entirely to Earth being obliterated before lunch, with no possibility of defense or counter-attack.

[Joe Momma]

So, Thrawn's old friends on the Chimaera stage a mutiny and join him, perhaps supported by some hacking from Thrawn. Thrawn wins.

It wouldn't even have to be that dramatic. Daala only began her guerrilla war against the New Republic because she believed the Empire was effectively destroyed. She gave that up to attempt to unite the remaining Imperial warlords and only took the drastic steps she did later because of said warlords' utter incompetence: "I didn't want to rule. I had no intention of becoming a political leader—but you have given me no choice. I cannot leave the Empire in the hands of fools like you."

Simply put, if a competent superior officer showed up, all indications are that she'd be happy to hand the reins over. But setting that aside as it's not really in the spirit of the OP...

But not even the Japanese fought on after having a mere two cities destroyed by nuclear bombs. Are you honestly saying the Federation is more cynical and has less regard for civilian life than the Japanese Empire?

Assuming Thrawn was able to communicate with higher-ups in the Federation, he might talk them into surrendering in the short term to pursue a long-term version of his campaign against Task Force One and the Outbound Flight.* Namely, isolating and disable a single ship and using the resources and information from that to work his way up to larger targets. How this would proceed would largely depend on how loyal the MIF's officers are to Daala personally. IOW, would Thrawn be able to kill or capture her and convince the other officers to let him assume command or would he have to eliminate them as well?

(* The Feds might be more willing to do a mock-surrender dance if they believed they would be able to quickly reverse the situation thanks to Thrawn, in addition to the other factors already mentioned in this thread. But it's certainly possible that the MIF would still have to char some biospheres before the Feds were willing to come to the table.)

His Federation allies would likely require him to either keep them from being implicated in such attempts and/or make it look like some other group such as the Romulans was responsible. Given how politically adept Thrawn was, he would likely be able to do so and might even be able to talk them into actually assisting said efforts in exchange for some of the loot, so to speak.

[Thanas]

So, Thrawn's old friends on the Chimaera stage a mutiny and join him, perhaps supported by some hacking from Thrawn. Thrawn wins.

It wouldn't even have to be that dramatic. Daala only began her guerrilla war against the New Republic because she believed the Empire was effectively destroyed. She gave that up to attempt to unite the remaining Imperial warlords and only took the drastic steps she did later because of said warlords' utter incompetence: "I didn't want to rule. I had no intention of becoming a political leader—but you have given me no choice. I cannot leave the Empire in the hands of fools like you."

Simply put, if a competent superior officer showed up, all indications are that she'd be happy to hand the reins over. But setting that aside as it's not really in the spirit of the OP...

Different Era - this is wank-but-still-idiot-Daala with her wank fleet from the godawful Darth Caedus arc.

He forwarded the calculations to Starfleet Command (without endorsing them - something that angered Bashir) who then dismissed it.

Ah, must have forgotten about that. You are of course right.

[Joe Momma]

Simply put, if a competent superior officer showed up, all indications are that she'd be happy to hand the reins over. But setting that aside as it's not really in the spirit of the OP...

Different Era - this is wank-but-still-idiot-Daala with her wank fleet from the godawful Darth Caedus arc.

Even then, she was willing to serve under Pellaeon's command when needed and agreed to help him stop Darth Caedus in part because she saw Caedus as an inept and dangerous politician. So I think even the later version of Daala would still accept Thrawn's assuming command without a fight if that was allowed in this scenario, but that's not really what the OP was shooting for.

OTOH, I'm relying on wookiepedia's version of these events -- I pretty much bailed out of reading the EU material long before that story arc began -- so I could be missing some quality batshit insanity regarding Daala's actual behavior.

[StarSword]

They leave civilians aboard starships during combat, don't they? Just saying.

This is not an attempt at a serious argument, right?

The situations where the civvies are endangered because Enterprise or whoever were blindsided, like the fiasco with USS Yamato in TNG: "Contagion", don't really count. I'm thinking more along the lines of DS9: "Emissary". USS Saratoga did not offload her civilians (including her First Officer's wife and child!) before gallivanting off to fight the Borg, who they freaking knew ahead of time were coming!

Ya gotta admit, it doesn't put Starfleet in the best light.

[Batman]

Putting aside the dubious morality of putting civilians on what for better or worse are the next best thing you've got to warships in the first place, was offloading the civilians actually an option? They had to be at Wolf 359 in time so no Warping to the nearest starbase, and I seriously doubt even a Galaxy (leave alone a measly Miranda) has the Warp capable shuttle complement to offload the civilians on short notice.
Given the civilians already were onboard, offloading them may simply not have been an option given the time constraints.

[Purple]

Why not just dump them all into escape pods and into space and than contact starfleet to send another ship to pick them up?
Sure it is not the most fun way to travel but it beats facing a cube.

[StarSword]

USS Saratoga did not offload her civilians (including her First Officer's wife and child!) before gallivanting off to fight the Borg, who they freaking knew ahead of time were coming!

They knew maybe a couple hours ahead of time, and the enemy was both faster and had a head start.

I would've bet money they had more warning than that in BoBW. I really need to add TNG to my Netflix queue, evidently.

They probably simply didn't have time to stop. Perhaps they could have shoved them out in shuttles or escape pods though.

Why didn't they?

I cited BoBW/Emissary because it was the most egregious incident. The canon database cites at least a dozen incidents in TNG where Enterprise knew ahead of time they were going into danger, and yet don't offload their civilian complement.

In DS9 "The Jem'Hadar", the USS Odyssey did unload their people before going in to fight. In early TNG, the saucer separation was used for that purpose.

I considered the Odyssey, but that didn't happen until several years later. I'm curious, though: can you cite an example where Enterprise did this?

It actually would seem to me to be counterproductive to leave the saucer behind, since most of the phaser mounts are on the saucer IIRC.

[Stark]

They almost certainly have policies around when and why to employ things like escape pods, and in particular when responding to an invasion there is some logic to imagining people floating in escape pods are in no less danger than they were on the ships.

[Batman]

Why not just dump them all into escape pods and into space and than contact starfleet to send another ship to pick them up?
Sure it is not the most fun way to travel but it beats facing a cube.

It's not unusual for TNG Starfleet vessels to take months to travel from a to b. I seriously doubt escape pod life support endurance is up to that.

[Azron_Stoma]

Out of universe, it was budget and pacing that meant they rarely did the saucer separation. In universe though, that is why the capability exists.

I never understood that, I mean wasn't the whole reason they did it in the first episode was so that they could use the stock footage to AVOID budget problems later on? I kinda understand the pacing problem though, but I'd imagine they could do a cut down version of it or something.

[Stofsk]

Relying on stock footage all the time = shit production values, basically. Most Star Trek episodes have to get by on the stock footage, but if you want to show a battle then at least put some effort into it by giving us new vfx shots.

Besides which, it was a pretty silly idea. Let's be frank.

[Eternal_Freedom]

As I recall, the saucer separation thing was brought up (and how rubbish it is) as a major plot point in one of the TNG books, "Rogue Saucer."

I won't explain the details if you haven't read it but saucer separation is a major theme and both Picard, Riker and indeed Admiral Nechayev say it is generally ineffective and a silly idea.

[Batman]

Of course it's a silly idea-not only does it mean using 60 percent+ of your ship's volume as a glorified lifeboat, italso removes a considerable fraction of its combat power, what with the two main phaser strips (not to mention two of the ship's three impulse engine assemblies) being on it. If the whole point of the separation idea is to get the civilians out of harm's way, why the hell is this thing so freaking huge and does carry a significant fraction of the ship's armament (and propulsion)? Even assuming half the 1000 person crew is civilians something far smaller would have sufficed.

[ComradeClaus]

Natassi Daala assesment:

Of course, the main problem w/ Daala was that she was created by K.J.Anderson. the guy who created the absurd nerdwank sun crusher. According to him, she was some gifted ingenue, who was passed over for promotion solely due to gender bias... Then she supposedly came to the attention of Tarkin cause she hacked into imperial wargaming simulations & made an impression (my own experience w/ online game hackers suggests she godmodded rather than having legit skillz). So in a REAL battle, she plainly sucks. She let a brainwashed scientist spend considerable time alone w/ a rebel prisoner (Han) w/out even having a guard watch for suspicious actions (ie, Han broke Qwi's conditioning, leading her to free him & Kyp)

Then after losing a ship to (Sun Crusher ramming!) She hits upon the bright idea to ambush rebel shipping. (actually her smartest brainstorm) After destroying ONE Corvette, she goes to the colony it was headed to & massacres less than a hundred refugees. (actually sending several AT-ATs to waste fuel) After recieving a signal sent from a long dormant probe droid (reactivated, then deactivated by Ackbar), she galivants to raid the Mon Cal shipyards...

This has to be her most retarded action of her career. Instead of targeting the shipyard outright, wasting it in a quick hit-n-run, she attacks the civillian cities instead, wasting crucial minutes as well as TIE Bomber ordnance. She hid her third ISD behind a moon, copying a tactic ol Tarkin thought up more than 10 years ago... Which he bragged to Ackbar who was his slave then... Ackbar, realizing what was about to happen, pilots the unfinished Star Cruiser Startide remotely, ramming the ISD & destroying it w/ all hands. (can an incomplete cruiser REALLY destroy a fully shielded ISD by ramming?) Her reaction is to continue bombarding civillians, rather than finish off the shipyard, only fleeing when a Republic fleet arrives.

She flees to the Cauldron Nebula, where she orders the crew of her more badly damaged ISD to ram Coruscant in a suicide mission, rather than return to commerce raiding. (Despite the success Leonia Tavira had w/ a single ISD in similar tactics) Kyp Durron & the Sun Crusher interfere w/ those plans.

The criticallly wounded flagship limps bact to the Maw, only to meet a few mere Corvettes & Nebulon-B. Yet she fails to destroy any of them. Instead, she blows up the facility, damaging her ship further & barely escaping w/ the weapons data she downloaded (WHICH STRANGELY IS NEVER REFERENCED AGAIN!)

That was in the Jedi Academy /Sith Kyp /Qwi Xux /Daala /Praexum Trilogy. At least the MT-ATs & Lando (he arrests a fugitive hacker ) were cool.

In Darksaber, she loses her flagship & personnel (the weapons data never referenced despite it being possible leverage) She wastes time talking to warlords, though she could've gotten results if she chose a warlord to be the mistress of. Her #2, Kratas (Brezhnev Brows) dies when Fat Warlord's (teradoc?) VSDs blow up the Shockwave.

Later she actually pulls a brilliant gambit which gets Pellaeon on her side, which is followed by the legendary assassination (by NERVE gas, despite the symptoms clearly being Blood Agent) Then she frees aliens & women to serve whever their abilities best aid the Remnant. (This allows Dorsk 81 to infiltrate her rally & Callista to board the KNight Hammer. Ironically justifying the Empire's racism & sexism! What is KJ Anderson trying to prove?!)

Her plan is rushed forward. For the most part it makes good sense. Basically large scale hit-n-run. Her only faults are attacking civillian targets, Khomm (which had cloning facilities she might've made use of) & the bulk of her force was sent to Yavin. (How 20 VSD & a SSD can't kill ONE MonCal Cruiser, I can't fathom)

But she gets bonus points for surviving a run-in w/ a Jedi who was bent on killing her. She even gets a badass one liner. (before giving her command to Pellaeon & resigning)

She's last seen (for over a decade) in Barbara Hambly's Planet of Twilight, where she basically Lawful Neutral & helps the Republic against a warlord spreading the Death Seed Plague. Where she's reunited w/ her old flame. Happy close to her career?

No... the Essential Chronology decided to make her bad again & go missing in a blind hyperspace jump.

Maybe she's bipolar or is a Dr Jekyl/ Ms Hyde? going from competent, to insane stupidity at the flip of a switch.

Or she was the victim of incompetent authors? She was just fine in Hambly's hands.

Thrawn otoh was written by Zahn, the master. (thank God his was the fisrt EU novels I read!)

I wonder how good daala would be if Zahn, Stackpole or Allston wrote her instead.

I haven't read past the NJO yet, so I don't know how much more crazy or stupid Daala has become. Frankly, the EU has failed hard since "StarByStar". It's now painful to read.

I'd have to say Thrawn wins it. He makes mistakes but doesn't fly into blind, Hitler-like rages. (Seriously read how Daala loses her shit at the warlord meating. The warlords & Pellaeon are like Then she sets off teh gas. She reminds me of Rachel from Big Brother 12 & 13 )

[StarSword]

Personally, I think Daala was promoted past her level of competence. Her best decisions (like disabling Harrsk's flagship) seem to come when she's in command of a single ship rather than a flotilla. She should've stayed a captain.

And actually, Claus, when she reappears in command of the Maw Irregular Fleet (that's during the Legacy of the Force series, after NJO and the Dark Nest Crisis), she's got quite an array of unusual weapons with her that were developed at the Maw Installation.

[Thanas]

The weapons data is referenced in the HoT duology where Pellaeon essentially declares it impractical and hugely cost-inefficient.

[StarSword]

The weapons data is referenced in the HoT duology where Pellaeon essentially declares it impractical and hugely cost-inefficient.

I thought that was the "Predictor" AI they tried to use for fighting while cloaked.