Topic: Ten Forward - The Star Trek Topic

@FullbringIchigo She was pretty two dimensional initially, but I think from becoming Kai onwards they really fleshed her out and went beyond the basic duplicitous villain trope.

By the time of her demise, I really felt that she was quite the well-meaning, genuine despotic zealot as well as a very troubled woman.

@KALofKRYPTON true she did get a lot better as time went on but she was nowhere near as good as the many other recurring characters such as Nog, Rom, Admiral Ross, Garak!

remember he was only ever meant to be in that one episode but he was so good they decided to make him a recurring character

@FullbringIchigo Elim Garak - probably the best (or my favourite at least) on screen character in all of Trek!

"Are you sure that's the point, Doctor?" "Of course. What else could it be?" "That you should never tell the same lie twice."

I'm not sure if that's true actually, certainly not at the point of casting Robinson... (NB his Garak book, 'A Stitch In Time' is an absolute treat!).

@KALofKRYPTON really it's even been said in interviews with him and panels at conventions, he was to be a one off guest star and that was it but he was so good they kept him on

and i'm glad they did

@FullbringIchigo @KALofKRYPTON Dukat was successful simply because, for a good number of his appearances, I genuinely couldn't figure out if he was a hero or a villain. Apparently, the reason for him going totally off-the-rails and into cartoonish super-villainy mode in Season Seven was because Ira Steven Behr was horrified to discover large parts of the fanbase sympathising with him; up until then, he'd thought everything had been crystal clear. Just goes to show how many layers Marc Alaimo added to the words on the page.

Winn is a love-to-hate character for me. I recoil whenever she shows up, but I'm supposed to.

Garak is cool. Sometimes they just stuck him in episodes because they wanted him around, and couldn't come up with a good reason, and it unfortunately showed. Most of the time, though, when an episode was constructed around him, it was a treat.

@RogerRoger Yep, I'll definitely update with my thoughts.

@RogerRoger @KALofKRYPTON So they are updating the story mode on Star Trek Online, what do you think?

https://www.arcgames.com/en/games/star-trek-online/news/detai...

@FullbringIchigo Looks pretty reasonable. Not many dev's would bother going back to enhance or streamline (very) old content.

@FullbringIchigo That's really impressive, especially given that Star Trek is something that's constantly evolving and tweaking its history (whether you agree with some of the tweaks or not).

I never really concentrated on the story in Star Trek Online, I'm ashamed to admit. I would frequently skip walls of text if they weren't voice-acted, or read ahead of the voice actors and cut them off once I'd finished enough to get a general idea of why I was doing what I was doing. I had other story-focused games at the time and Star Trek Online's narrative presentation didn't click outside of cutscenes (hey, it's an old MMO, so that's not really a criticism). I just wanted to level up enough to get my favourite starships and walk around everywhere "being in Star Trek".

It's also why I'm hopeless at actually playing the game, too, as I insist on keeping all my characters and starships looking canon, including in terms of which weapons and shields they use, so I'm ridiculously underpowered in combat and always see others in Deep Space Encounters wiping everything out before I can even fire a photon torpedo.

One day soon, I'll create a new character and actually pay attention.

@RogerRoger I recall a few years ago when my friend told me I should try it out. I had a Sony ultrabook at the time which should have been able to handle it but it ran like trash. I had a look at his set up and he'd macro'd loads of functions and had the most ridiculous OTT loadout for the Galaxy class he was running.

It was brilliant to watch, I forget the enemy ship, may have been a D'Deriex - but thing just decimated it in about 4 seconds without taking a scratch! There was a knowing look as he said - " yeah, I know it's bull****, but still...".

@KALofKRYPTON @RogerRoger i can normally survive any encounter with my weapons and defences on my ship and they are all still "canon" ie: Phasers and Quantum Torpedoes on Fed ships, Disrutors and Photon Torpedoes on Klingon ships etc etc but then again i spent ages upgrading all my equipment, they are all now ultra rare XV for example

it's a Galaxy Refit class (the 3 nacelle version from All Good Things) for my main Fed, an Negh'var class for my Klingon and a D'deridex class for my Romulan by the way

@KALofKRYPTON Somebody once saw me parked outside Spacedock in my Universe-Class and asked if I wanted to do PvP because he wanted to go up against the largest starship in the game, and I agreed. He was in a Galaxy-Class Refit and it was almost comical to see these two vessels squaring off one another... and yet he destroyed me in seconds. His weapons were all exotic and he had tons of tactical abilities, whereas I'm a science officer so could, um... scan him, I guess? At one point, he even stopped firing and just let me take shots at him, and with full phasers and a spread of transphasic torpedoes I took 1% off his shields. It was pathetic.

@FullbringIchigo Yeah, I've tried upgrading some of my weapons and I've got a few ships I rely on for the really high-level fights (the Deep Space Encounters in the Delta Quadrant, for example). I loved getting the Son'a ships because they all came with isolytic beams, cannons and torpedoes and they seem really overpowered by default. I was suddenly good! Otherwise I just try and get clever with each starship's special abilities (antimatter spreads, the Picard Maneuver, Multi-Vector Assault Mode... oh, and whatever the heck comes out of the deflector of my Universe-Class that can split a Borg Cube in a single shot, yet still didn't work against that PvP guy) and circle around until I've worn them down.

I'd swap out the Negh'var for a Vor'cha or a Raptor, but that's purely because of looks. I'd be scared of a Negh'var because they were the default "serious business" Klingon ships in the show! Agreed with the choice of a D'deridex, though; that's what my Romulan commands.

@RogerRoger So keeping up with Trek news here are a few of the things in the news

Pine wants to do Star Trek 4

https://trekmovie.com/2018/09/06/chris-pine-says-he-would-lov...

CBS and Viacom potential merger still on ice

https://trekmovie.com/2018/09/06/reports-cbs-in-talks-to-end-...

as for me i would love to see Pine back although if they can't get him they could always promote Kirk to Admiral off screen and make Spock Captain and as for CBS/Viacom it needs to happen every franchise rights both companies hold are split between the 2 and just think of the many shows and films that can't be made because of it

they need to get their thumbs out of their a** and sort it out, if Disney and Fox can merge so can they

@FullbringIchigo I'd never thought of making Spock captain and promoting Kirk off-screen; especially since he had that moment of doubt in Beyond, where he wanted to apply for... was it Commodore or something? It wouldn't be impossible. That said, I'm certain they'll work something out. Wouldn't be the same without him.

As for selfish, greedy rich people deciding the fate of things more important than themselves, let's not open that can of ranting fury, shall we?

In case it wasn't clear, I agree with you 100% by the way.

@RogerRoger the thing is the comic series fills the gaps between the movies so they could do it there if they had to but your right and it just wouldn't be the same without Pine

@FullbringIchigo I've never gotten into the Kelvin Timeline comics (or any Trek comics for that matter, save one graphic novel to explain what Picard and the Enterprise did during the Dominion War).

Would you recommend them?

@RogerRoger well the Kelvin ones are actually canon but they are pretty good too so i would recommend them anyway

for example one of the explains what happened to Khan and just what Admiral Marcus did to him to turn him into John Harrison another shows what happened to Nero and how Romulus was destroyed (this is the one with Data/B4 as Captain of the Enterprise and one that dealt with what happens to Vulcans who under go Pon-Far when they can't go home now that Vulcan is gone

there also one with Captain Robert April in it and according to that one the Enterprise in the movies is actually a complete rebuild of the original one, so the Kelvin Timeline Enterprise is actually a refit

@FullbringIchigo Thanks for that; actually sounds quite interesting, I may give them a look-see at some stage, then. I quite like the idea of the 2009 Enterprise being the refit already.

Earlier in this topic you asked about good shots to use as desktop wallpaper and thought I'd share a couple I've been using recently. They all come from Google Image Search so I can't give you their actual source, but I'd imagine quite a few are from various digital artists on DeviantArt or other places. There's also obviously The Light Works, who do amazing work.

(There's just something about starships in drydock...)

@RogerRoger well that's effed everything up then, guess the franchise will remain split for a while

https://trekmovie.com/2018/09/09/breaking-cbs-announces-settl...

@FullbringIchigo On Moonves, in addition being a sex pest: "He was reportedly instrumental in pushing for the cancellation of Star Trek: Enterprise in 2005."

Good riddance!