DS9 "The Reckoning"

[clearspira]

(c) [Off the topic of Winn] The biggest question with the Prophets is why the Dominion never made a chroniton array and killed them from their side of the wormhole, as the Pah Wraiths tried to get O'Brien to do in the first episode in which they appeared.

The Dominion doesn't know that that's even possible. It's unclear whether the Dominion on the Gamma side is even aware of the existence of the Prophets. There's a number of ways their Alpha forces could have found out about that, of course, but Weyoun doesn't seem to care.

That's something I would have changed, by the way. If the Dominion had had retaking the station to use its emitters to kill the Prophets as a war goal, that would have not only kept DS9 closer to the action, but would have upped the stakes considerably.

One of the weird/bad writing attributes of the Dominion is that they are more advanced than the Federation in many ways. Long range transporters, weapons that go through shields, the ability to see through a cloak etc. and yet are frequently outdone by those Federation doctors and engineers that ''can turn rocks into replicators''. It made sense in SG-1 as the Goa'uld were stagnant, and the Asgard and Ancients had lost the ability to think like 20th/21st century humans.
But here? It really does not make sense that the Dominion could not work out the weaknesses of the Prophets if the Federation could, and it makes no sense that they wouldn't do it. Just set up some emitters on the Gamma side of the wormhole and shoot until there is no one left (and lets remember that they had five seasons to work out that the Prophets were real before it was closed).

[Durandal_1707]

(c) [Off the topic of Winn] The biggest question with the Prophets is why the Dominion never made a chroniton array and killed them from their side of the wormhole, as the Pah Wraiths tried to get O'Brien to do in the first episode in which they appeared.

The Dominion doesn't know that that's even possible. It's unclear whether the Dominion on the Gamma side is even aware of the existence of the Prophets. There's a number of ways their Alpha forces could have found out about that, of course, but Weyoun doesn't seem to care.

That's something I would have changed, by the way. If the Dominion had had retaking the station to use its emitters to kill the Prophets as a war goal, that would have not only kept DS9 closer to the action, but would have upped the stakes considerably.

One of the weird/bad writing attributes of the Dominion is that they are more advanced than the Federation in many ways. Long range transporters, weapons that go through shields, the ability to see through a cloak etc. and yet are frequently outdone by those Federation doctors and engineers that ''can turn rocks into replicators''. It made sense in SG-1 as the Goa'uld were stagnant, and the Asgard and Ancients had lost the ability to think like 20th/21st century humans.
But here? It really does not make sense that the Dominion could not work out the weaknesses of the Prophets if the Federation could, and it makes no sense that they wouldn't do it. Just set up some emitters on the Gamma side of the wormhole and shoot until there is no one left (and lets remember that they had five seasons to work out that the Prophets were real before it was closed).

The Federation didn't work any of that out either. They know about the existence of the Prophets because the Prophets themselves decided to make themselves known to the Bajorans and to Sisko, and they know about the chroniton beam trick because a paghwraith gave it to O'Brien. Without all of that, there's really no way of knowing that the wormhole isn't just what it appears to be—a spatial anomaly of the sort Voyager encountered every other week.

[G-Man]

The Federation didn't work any of that out either. They know about the existence of the Prophets because the Prophets themselves decided to make themselves known to the Bajorans and to Sisko, and they know about the chroniton beam trick because a paghwraith gave it to O'Brien. Without all of that, there's really no way of knowing that the wormhole isn't just what it appears to be—a spatial anomaly of the sort Voyager encountered every other week.

No, Rom figured out that the Pah Wraiths were making the station into a chroniton array before they revealed it - and the idea that chroniton radiation would hurt an alien like the Prophets appeared to be something that was deducible with common physics. In fact, even the trick of turning the station into a chroniton array was not something that was presented as a difficult trick - the difficulty was figuring out that that was the purpose of the modifications.

[FaxModem1]

(c) [Off the topic of Winn] The biggest question with the Prophets is why the Dominion never made a chroniton array and killed them from their side of the wormhole, as the Pah Wraiths tried to get O'Brien to do in the first episode in which they appeared.

The Dominion doesn't know that that's even possible. It's unclear whether the Dominion on the Gamma side is even aware of the existence of the Prophets. There's a number of ways their Alpha forces could have found out about that, of course, but Weyoun doesn't seem to care.

That's something I would have changed, by the way. If the Dominion had had retaking the station to use its emitters to kill the Prophets as a war goal, that would have not only kept DS9 closer to the action, but would have upped the stakes considerably.

One of the weird/bad writing attributes of the Dominion is that they are more advanced than the Federation in many ways. Long range transporters, weapons that go through shields, the ability to see through a cloak etc. and yet are frequently outdone by those Federation doctors and engineers that ''can turn rocks into replicators''. It made sense in SG-1 as the Goa'uld were stagnant, and the Asgard and Ancients had lost the ability to think like 20th/21st century humans.
But here? It really does not make sense that the Dominion could not work out the weaknesses of the Prophets if the Federation could, and it makes no sense that they wouldn't do it. Just set up some emitters on the Gamma side of the wormhole and shoot until there is no one left (and lets remember that they had five seasons to work out that the Prophets were real before it was closed).

If you need to justify it, remember their scientists seem to mainly be Vorta clones. Ones which, if not doing well, are killed off and cloned again for a fresh perspective.

And remember, the Dominion IS stagnant. They have tricks in their arsenal, but they are thousands of years old and curb any non-conformist thought out of their population via Jem'Hadar invasion or disease.

That's going to severely limit their abilities to counter something that they haven't run into before. Whereas a strength of the Federation is embracing multiple points of view being brought to the table in a problem. The Dominion also took their time trying to destroy the various Alpha Quadrant powers via subterfuge. If the Dominion struck immediately, the Federation might not have had a chance to adapt their shields, or build up their fleet. But that would have caused the other powers to band together due to the existential threat being presented so quickly.

On the plus side for the Dominion, their slow and steady approach took quite a few powers out of the war before it began. The Cardassians we're on their side, the Romulans were neutral until they joined the UFP side, the So'na supplied them with Ketracel White until the events of Insurrection, and the Tholians stayed out of the war entirely.

That's a lot of powers sidelined via good old fashioned diplomacy. It's only for some small fortunes that they didn't further curb the UFP side(blowing up Bajor's sun and taking out a combined Starfleet/Klingon/Romulan fleet, the Klingon invasion of Cardassia, the panic about Changelings on Earth that nearly led to a civil war, etc.)

The Dominion had tricks, they just didn't always pan out. The ones that did hurt quite a few major powers in the Alpha Quadrant.

Wormhole aliens that vanish a fleet because of prayer is probably out of their wheelhouse.

[Durandal_1707]

The Federation didn't work any of that out either. They know about the existence of the Prophets because the Prophets themselves decided to make themselves known to the Bajorans and to Sisko, and they know about the chroniton beam trick because a paghwraith gave it to O'Brien. Without all of that, there's really no way of knowing that the wormhole isn't just what it appears to be—a spatial anomaly of the sort Voyager encountered every other week.

No, Rom figured out that the Pah Wraiths were making the station into a chroniton array before they revealed it - and the idea that chroniton radiation would hurt an alien like the Prophets appeared to be something that was deducible with common physics. In fact, even the trick of turning the station into a chroniton array was not something that was presented as a difficult trick - the difficulty was figuring out that that was the purpose of the modifications.

How does that change what I said? Rom figured out what it did, but the paghwraiths are the ones that introduced the technology to them in the first place.

Anyone can make a wheel if they've already seen one, but coming up with the concept of the wheel when it doesn't yet exist is much more of an undertaking.

And again, the Dominion doesn't even know that the Prophets exist. For all they know, the wormhole just isn't working for the moment because of the usual crazy Voyager technobabble of the week. They'd probably just been patiently sending a probe through at regular intervals to see if it'd cleared up yet.

[Fianna]

It's not like the existence of the Prophets was a secret, though. Hell, Keiko made the wormhole aliens part of her school's curriculum. And given how changelings occasionally impersonated high-ranking members of Starfleet, they should have had access to most of the information the Federation had about the wormhole.

[Yukaphile]

I don't think the Dominion ever really saw them as a threat, however, until they wiped out their own fleet. And as others have said, Weyoun was never interested. He saw the Founders as gods, not the "wormhole aliens." So in a way, you can blame the Founders' genetic tampering for that.

[Fianna]

It just feels a little bit like The X-Files, where even though Mulder and Scully investigate all manner of paranormal stuff, the government conspiracy only pops up when they poke around something involving aliens; uncovering evidence that voodoo magic, psychic assassins, and actual demons exist never seems to have any bearing on the conspiracy's plans.

[CareerKnight]

How does that change what I said? Rom figured out what it did, but the paghwraiths are the ones that introduced the technology to them in the first place.

Anyone can make a wheel if they've already seen one, but coming up with the concept of the wheel when it doesn't yet exist is much more of an undertaking.

And again, the Dominion doesn't even know that the Prophets exist. For all they know, the wormhole just isn't working for the moment because of the usual crazy Voyager technobabble of the week. They'd probably just been patiently sending a probe through at regular intervals to see if it'd cleared up yet.

Another thing is, would the wormhole even survive if the Prophets were killed? Stable wormholes are (according to Trek) incredibly rare and its kind of implied that this one is stable because the Prophets inhabit it.

And yeah, I think their actions with Sarah prove that he would have been dead meat if that Prophet had won.

I want to save my thoughts on this until Chuck finally gets around to that episode so I will just give a very short part here. Which is more likely, that the DS9 writers were ok with rape and thought it wasn't a big deal or that they had a different explanation for what happened that didn't involve rape and didn't include it in the story cause they didn't think through the implications? I'm willing to give the DS9 writers the benefit of a doubt and go with they're not ok with rape and were just idiots in this situation (god knows there is plenty of evidence for them being capable of being dumb). Now you are likely think what other possibilities are there to which I have to reply I already said I wanted to save this till the episode proper comes out (plus its late and I am tired) so just think about it for five minutes, I came up with several alternatives in roughly that amount of time and I'm not even good at this stuff.

[Yukaphile]

Given how competent the DS9 writers were, I'm not satisfied with just calling them idiots and leaving it at that. Remember, these were the same people who took the concept of "comfort women," all the women and girls who were just spit on and treated like cattle in WWII, of all ethnic backgrounds, and just... made it meh. Even SF Debris commented on this. I think it had to do with their entirely male perspective, and we needed more women in the writing room. They even had Sisko comment that she left her "husband," because she got control back. If that's not rape, what is? I think Moore's comment summed it up best, that it was hard keeping all these plot threads together so late into DS9. But it's also the fact they were insensitive or "limited" on certain issues to begin with.