Why is the Alpha Quadrant not under the Raptor's wings?

[Prometheus Unbound]

I don't feel like someone can be a real fan of a work of art, while entirely missing the point of that work of art,

Never met a Nirvana fan I take it

[Joun_Lord]

Being offended, ranting angrily as I said, about Starfleet's "failure" to be a military-oriented service* is in large part missing the entire point and message of Star Trek.

The very message of the show can be different at times. There is nothing really constant, even the promise is the brightness of tomorrow, how technology will make life better, and the spirit of exploration that are important themes of the franchise aren't always there, there was an entire movie preaching how the past is superior and technology is bad.

There are alot of messages and points of Trek.

One the messages some take from Trek is the hypocritical nature of some of the work. How Starfleet is not supposed to be a military while acting like it, how the Prime Directive is treated like religious dogma and used to allow our heroes to allow bad shit to happen. How people in paradise can act like saints while looking down upon those who live in the dirt for not acting so nice. How snobbish the supposed enlightened humans of the Federation are and how they aren't all that different or better then humans of our time, just can pat themselves on the back on how much better they are because they don't have to deal with the problems we face.

The various hypocritical examples of racism, sexism, gender, rape, sexuality, and crazy people who somehow got to be in charge that the show preaches about while doing the thing they preach about.

People like myself rant, sometimes angrily, about Starfleet's failure to be a military oriented service not because of its failure to do so but because of the hypocrisy of it.

I don't feel like someone can be a real fan of a work of art, while entirely missing the point of that work of art

Fans of something have different interpretations of things, even different from author intent, thats part of art.

[Crazedwraith]

Also the Ent-E is a top-class ship, one of only a dozen, while D'Deridexes are standard issue ships seen everywhere. The apposite comparison for a D'Deridex is the Warp 7 Miranda class.

Your original statement was on warp drive knowledge though. If you can make a warp drive that's better than your rivals you can be considered to have a better knowledge even if it's not implemented on a wide spread level.

(Though the Romulans might have a similar level of knowledge of a theoretical level)

Also when was the Miranda limited to Warp 7? They seem to keep up with galaxy and other advanced designs in fleet actions.

[Shroom Man 777]

Simon said that it bugs him. It doesn't mean they are disqualified from the fan club.

But this does remind me of Kanastrous and his fellow folks who worked on the Star Trek films just shitting on this bigot headcase who happened to be a Trekkie, so Kanastrous and co. were just shitting on the fuckface and saying "your Trekkie card has been revoked" and the fuckface thought they were being literally real and was blubbering and the adults were just having lulz. That was hilarious.

I guess what Simon means is that... it's kind of like in Star Wars fandom wherein - say what you will about Lucas but he poured his soul into the Campbellian voyage of Luke, the (orientalist) mythos of the Force and its esoteric principles - we see all these annoying adolescent Imperial and Sith wankers. They're still Warsies but Jesus Christ, they're annoying and it's like they saw entirely different movies (who knows what shitty glorified fanfic novels or comics they read though).

What a bunch of Kylos. Makes ya think "midichlorians" is just the Star Wars language's equivalent for "hormones." Maybe they make holocrons out of the stuff.

Or it's like how Alan Moore wrote Rorschach to be a sadsack fuckface who has no fucking clue what sex is and is a portrait of pathological neuroses embodying the fetishism of vigilantism so when he, Moore, sees people who genuinely think Rorschach is awesome he's like "oh my god what a bunch of idiots stay the fuck away from me."

[Prometheus Unbound]

Also the Ent-E is a top-class ship, one of only a dozen, while D'Deridexes are standard issue ships seen everywhere. The apposite comparison for a D'Deridex is the Warp 7 Miranda class.

Your original statement was on warp drive knowledge though. If you can make a warp drive that's better than your rivals you can be considered to have a better knowledge even if it's not implemented on a wide spread level.

(Though the Romulans might have a similar level of knowledge of a theoretical level)

Also when was the Miranda limited to Warp 7? They seem to keep up with galaxy and other advanced designs in fleet actions.

The fleets might only go along at warp 7 :S


I don't see why it's difficult for anyone to picture a D'Derridex being a little slower than a Galaxy class (but still within ... I mean they were only *minutes* behind, it's like warp 9.8 and warp 9.79 or something) - the thing is freaking *huge*. Trying to generate a warp field / subspace field must be really energy intensive - and moving something that mass will take more energy.

It's not like they're limited to warp 6 - they *can* overtake a Galaxy class ship - it just damages their engines.

I would expect their smaller ships to manage to keep up easier as they don't have to generate a few cubic kilometres of subspace stuff.

[NecronLord]

Also the Ent-E is a top-class ship, one of only a dozen, while D'Deridexes are standard issue ships seen everywhere. The apposite comparison for a D'Deridex is the Warp 7 Miranda class.

Your original statement was on warp drive knowledge though. If you can make a warp drive that's better than your rivals you can be considered to have a better knowledge even if it's not implemented on a wide spread level.

(Though the Romulans might have a similar level of knowledge of a theoretical level)

Also when was the Miranda limited to Warp 7? They seem to keep up with galaxy and other advanced designs in fleet actions.

Tech manuals list the crusing speed of the D'deridex as Warp 9, and of the Miranda as Warp 7 with a push capacity of warp 9, as I recall.

A lot has been made of Tin Man, but I don't think it's a meaningful comparison. The Enterprise is a very special ship.

[NecronLord]

I don't see why it's difficult for anyone to picture a D'Derridex being a little slower than a Galaxy class (but still within ... I mean they were only *minutes* behind, it's like warp 9.8 and warp 9.79 or something) - the thing is freaking *huge*. Trying to generate a warp field / subspace field must be really energy intensive - and moving something that mass will take more energy.

It's not like they're limited to warp 6 - they *can* overtake a Galaxy class ship - it just damages their engines.

I would expect their smaller ships to manage to keep up easier as they don't have to generate a few cubic kilometres of subspace stuff.

I don't? As I said, there are design tradeoffs being made, obviously. I'm saying that the D'deridex being slower doesn't necessarily mean 'Federation Warp Technology' as a blanket category, is better.

[Q99]

The Galaxy class almost certainly had brand-spanking-new more advanced warp cores... I mean, the thing was certainly unstable enough in the early seasons, seemed like a new design!

[NecronLord]

I think it was explicit in Farpoint that the ship was new?

[Crazedwraith]

I think it was explicit in Farpoint that the ship was new?

If not explicit then heavily implied. There in All Good things and in the epiose with rhe Yamato.

[Prometheus Unbound]

I don't see why it's difficult for anyone to picture a D'Derridex being a little slower than a Galaxy class (but still within ... I mean they were only *minutes* behind, it's like warp 9.8 and warp 9.79 or something) - the thing is freaking *huge*. Trying to generate a warp field / subspace field must be really energy intensive - and moving something that mass will take more energy.

It's not like they're limited to warp 6 - they *can* overtake a Galaxy class ship - it just damages their engines.

I would expect their smaller ships to manage to keep up easier as they don't have to generate a few cubic kilometres of subspace stuff.

I don't? As I said, there are design tradeoffs being made, obviously. I'm saying that the D'deridex being slower doesn't necessarily mean 'Federation Warp Technology' as a blanket category, is better.

Sorry I wasn't debating you I was just going off on my own tangent. Wasn't directed specifically at you - but I agree with you pretty much.

Like the Krenim - they could only go Warp 6 - but had considerably more advanced shields and temporal tech.

In a way, I'd argue the Romulan warp drive is superiour to Federation ones - they have to generate a much, much larger subspace field to move a D'Derridex (cube square law) - yet it can more or less keep up with the Enterprise at Maximum warp (like 99.99999... %) - ergo if the ship was a bit smaller, it'd possibly be faster.

And remember the Dominion dreadnaught thing in Valliant? That could only go at warp 4 due to its size I think?

[Prometheus Unbound]

I think it was explicit in Farpoint that the ship was new?

The engines had not been tested at those speeds I think (9.. One of Picard's first lines is:

"Let's see what this Galaxy class starship can do...."

It was out of its shakedown run but Farpoint was probably the first time it left Sector 001. Enterprise would need less time than USS Galaxy did of course since that was the ship that would have all the initial problems.

Ironically that's (USS Galaxy) one of the few original Galaxy runs that made it through the Dominion war and into Nemesis. The first one, the one that had *all* the bugs, that one survived.

The Dedication plaque tells us it was launched in 2363 - on Stardate 40795.5

http://pre10.deviantart.net/1cee/th/pre ... 93acrx.jpg

It was certainly Picard's first mission on the Enterprise and half the crew were not on board.

As well as this, we see in All Good Things, Tasha took Picard onboard the Enterprise and they departed like an hour after that so - yes, very much so, Enterprise was brand spanking new.



Hmm. I wonder what came first - the dedication plaque with the exact stardate on it and the ship was launched exactly on time (dangerous!) or was the plaque filled in after they left spacedock?

[FireNexus]

They simply may not commission the ships until after heir shakedown run and completion, so they do the dedication on the official commissioning ceremony. Though, launching exactly on time under any circumstances might explain the warp core ejector seemingly being gunkier than my bike chain after riding ten miles on fresh asphalt.

[Shroom Man 777]

Investment in the speed-capabilities of the drives would have to take into consideration the builder's budget, territorial considerations (massive alliance, smaller holed up nation, long-reaching invasion-happy regime, etc.), expected roles (long-range exploration vessel, long-range strike/defense vessels, etc.) and other factors.

Like... does increased speed compromise stealth (cloak) in Warp?

Does the lack of stealth/cloak make speed more important for keeping element of surprise in strikes and the ability to avoid interception?

On the other hand, does the presence of cloak capability make speed less of a dealmaker/breaker because aside from out-running targets and pursuers, there's the option of just cloaking away?

Does maintaining cloak while moving require enough energy that it would affect how much energy goes to the drive and thus how fast the vessel can go?

[Khaat]

Like... does increased speed compromise stealth (cloak) in Warp?

Yes, we see this in Tinman: the Enterprise picks up the Romulans moving at high speed and cloaked because the claok is compromised, either by the energy required for the speed, or the balancing of the cloak's effects (Face of the Enemy).

On the other hand, does the presence of cloak capability make speed less of a dealmaker/breaker because aside from out-running targets and pursuers, there's the option of just cloaking away?

Does maintaining cloak while moving require enough energy that it would affect how much energy goes to the drive and thus how fast the vessel can go?

Face of the Enemy suggests so: the Romulans just sat there while the Enterprise was using sensors to "pick through" the debris of the trading vessel.

[Shroom Man 777]

I wonder if the Romulans have vessels that don't have cloaks and are optimized for fast patrols.

Or... it's a trivial matter and in circumstances wherein faster speeds are required and stealth isn't an issue, a cloak-capable Romulan ship just steps on the accelerator and either drops its cloak to divert power to the drives or keeps the cloak up and hope that it's cloak, while probably compromised, can still afford a degree of stealth vs. less-capable-sensors.

"We detect a cloaked Romulan ship going that way" might show compromised cloak, but the cloak might still be functional enough that while one can tell the general direction of the vessel, getting specific coordinates - enough for a weapon's lock - might not be a given?

Like... Skimmer et al's deliberations on real life stealth, LO technology vs radars, IRSTs, SAMs, etc.

And perhaps the size and scope of Romulan territory... its degree of fortification, the distribution of forward operating bases, etc. might determine how they determine how fast their ships can go.

If its borders with the Federation isn't that expansive, then slower cloaky ambush vessels might be better. Whereas if the other side of Romulan space, Romulan Siberia, faces... less formidable opponents, if it is some vast frontier, then a not-so-cloaky but more-speedy long-ranged MiG-25/31 kind of patrol vessel might be deployed there.

[Khaat]

I wonder if the Romulans have vessels that don't have cloaks and are optimized for fast patrols.
...
And perhaps the size and scope of Romulan territory... its degree of fortification, the distribution of forward operating bases, etc. might determine how they determine how fast their ships can go.

If its borders with the Federation isn't that expansive, then slower cloaky ambush vessels might be better. Whereas if the other side of Romulan space, Romulan Siberia, faces... less formidable opponents, if it is some vast frontier, then a not-so-cloaky but more-speedy long-ranged MiG-25/31 kind of patrol vessel might be deployed there.

They might, we weren't really shown that much of the Romulan military. And the Federation border specifically, is a "no fly zone" by treaty. Doubtless the Romulans have listening posts and warships close enough to respond, but it's a stale conflict for the most part.

TNG Romulans did make a point of "we were busy (with something) but now we're back" early in the series. Never explained it, that I can recall.

[Shroom Man 777]

No fly zone and persistent enemy surveillance and treaty obligations (that need sneakiness to violate) would be a great reason why the most people see of them are unseeable cloak-capable ships. Presumably their teen-series 4th generation War Birds and Birds of Prey or whatever with lesser low-RCS/LO capabilities are stationed in other places. Like, the Romulan vessels near the Neutral Zone could be the Romulan equivalent of RAPID RAPTOR forward-deployed F-22s to face advanced enemy IADS with the Federation being the Russian/Chinese advanced S-400 radar-equipped equivalent. Whereas Space Yemen has non-stealthy Romulan F-18s and F-16s bombing the crap out of puny alienoids in alien mud huts.

Maybe the Romulan senate has people harping about the uselessness of cloaks and the expensiveness of their D'Dedrixes and all sorts of malfunctions and budget overruns and over-promised under-performing multirole capacities or whatever. Maybe they're saying that more teen-series warbirds are better.

[Q99]

I bet everything has cloaks, they seem pretty easy to mount, it's just the old ones are pretty easy for the Federation to see through- but, may work at long range, and allows them to hide from lesser species easily. And mounting a cloak on a not-optimized-for-cloaks ship is doable, just doesn't work as well, but their doctrine probably throws one in just-in-case.

Voyager encountered an old Klingon ship with cloak and saw right through it, and they put cloaks on all their BoPs. If the Klingons put cloaks on nigh everything, bet the Romulans do too.

[Lord Revan]

I suspect that while most Romulan military vessels have cloaks (we saw that a senator's shuttle had a cloak in DS9) that not all cloaks are equal with differences in things like how easy it's to see thru the cloak or how long does it take between the ship becoming visible enough to be fired upon and the shields coming back up. A patrol ship with a noname CO and stationed at ass end of Star Empire would probably have a basic cloak good enough against smugglers or pirates but not really up to the standards of frontline use anymore, while a prototype ship with CO that's a legand within the imperial star navy would have cloak that's best what romulans have avaible. we know that romulans didn't really use cloaks until the 2150s at earliest but more likely not before 2260s (the ENT apperence of a cloak capable Romulan ship have serious problems with earlier depictions of what romulan cloaks are capable due to being invisible to even 32nd century tech)

[Shroom Man 777]

It could be like real life "stealth." An F-117, B-2, F-22 and F-35 have different degrees of this and even non-stealthy craft like F-18s, Rafales, Eurofighter and SR-71 have degrees of radar cross section minimization to try and make them smaller targets.

[Q99]

Yea, the purpose of a low-grade cloak isn't to try and sneak up behind a modern Federation ship- really that'd just be presenting them with an easy shot.

It's so that said ship doesn't notice you at distant sensor range or when it's just zooming past at warp, or when you're also using natural interference for cover and hoping they don't notice you.

Now, those front-line captains, they get their cloaks upgraded often, and run simulations on how best to get the drop on a Galaxy or Vorcha.

we know that romulans didn't really use cloaks until the 2150s at earliest but more likely not before 2260s (the ENT apperence of a cloak capable Romulan ship have serious problems with earlier depictions of what romulan cloaks are capable due to being invisible to even 32nd century tech)

Quite. Heck, the Balance of Terror cloak was only *semi* effective! Powerful but not flawless.

[LadyTevar]

In "Balance of Terror", the Romulans were not out to take on a starship head-to-head. Their mission was to hit the Neutral Zone Outposts in quick, surgical strikes, possibly as a lead-up to the Romulans running a more conventional warfleet through. They failed in that mission as soon as the SOS got out.

Off screen: "Balance of Terror" was based on a WWII movie "The Enemy Below" (1957?) about a battle of wits between a US Destroyer and a German U-Boat.

[Lord Revan]

Most of trek is pretty consistent that you can detect cloaked (romulan/klingon) ships if you're observant enough (or explictly looking for one), only exceptions being Scimitar that was said to be an advanced prototype using a brand new cloak and another is the BoP from "Minefield" that is totally inconsistent in terms of performance of the cloak as normally cloaked ships are depicted as really hard but not impossible to detect for ships of that era but the BoP in "Minefield" was invisible not only to the Enterprise's sensors but also the special sensors meant to detect cloaked ships from the 32nd century given to the Enterprise crew by the temporal operative known as "Daniels". That is why I prefer to dismiss the cloak use in "Minefield" as timeline inconsistency as the cloak there is simply way too powerful to be consistent with any depiction of cloaks before it. The holocloaks later in ENT I don't have much issue with and I could imagine them being a precursor to actual cloaks later down the line.

EDIT:in fact Georgi LaForge mentions several ways Starfleet has discovered to detect cloaked ships in Nemesis, in relation of them not working for the Scimitar