Civil Defense (DS9)

[Dînadan]

Yep - autocorrect can be a bitch if you don't pay full attention.

[ScreamingDoom]

Random thought on maybe why they were incompatible - what if the holodecks had their own generator(s) and a closed power system with no terminals/junctions/etc that they could use to plug them into the main power grid? Doesn't explain though why, when it was clear there was no immediate way home and power needed to be rationed that Janeway didn't order the holodecks kept off line and the power grid for them ripped out so a new one that connected to the main grid could be installed.

That could've been interesting. Imagine a scene in the Magic Meeting Room where they talk about the shortage of power and Janeway asked "what about the holodecks?" and B'lanna had to explain that they were on a totally different system -- the holodecks are notorious for failures that cascade out to the ship as a whole, so the decision was made to design it so that they could be cut off completely from main power in order to prevent Holodeck Episodes. If they have a seperate power system, then it's easy to shut down manually if something goes horribly wrong.

Then have Janeway ask how long it would take to re-purpose the holodeck generators for main power, have B'lanna give a figure -- say, several weeks -- and then have Neelix as Self-Assigned Morale Officer make the point that maybe turning off the holodecks on a ship stuck so far from home isn't the best idea for crew morale.

There, now Voyager can have their stupid holodeck episodes and it's not as bad a Voodoo Shark as it was.

If that's what the function of it, whom ever set the goals for the Intrepid needs to shitcan whomever layed the ship out because I cannot see how going small and lower powered is the way to go for long term isolation from support. That thing should like a carrier, not a gunboat.

Maybe the idea was not to carry everything needed with them, but be able to "live off the land"; doing small-scale remote mining, harvesting gas giants for deuterium, that sort of thing. For that, you want as small as possible.

Of course, it doesn't explain why they were so ill-prepared to do any of that. Hell, they had to build their own aeroponics stuff in a disused cargo bay. You'd think that'd be standard.

[Dînadan]

A further justification for having the holodecks be designed on a seperate system - remember all the way back in the TNG episode where Geordi uses it to simulate the Galaxy class's designer? Remember how he had to beg to have it kept running so he could come up with the solution? What if that was picked up on by the designers/builders of newer ships and it was decided that in addition to avoiding holodecks malfunctions, a seperate system would help future engineers also be able to use the holodecks for simulations and the like without having to rely on the main power grid in case a similar situation occurred where that wouldn't be viable (or running said simulation would drain the power reserves when those were needed to be conserved as much as possible)?


As for Voyager being underequipped, it's actually easy to justify - remember it was supposed to be its maiden voyage and only supposed to be a jaunt around the Badlands to find some missing Marquis, where if anything did happen, DS9 and the Defiant were a short radio call away, so it's feasible that Starfleet didn't fully equip it yet (remember this is a Starfleet that sent a broken ship on a hostage rescue mission and sent the Enterprise-B on its maiden voyage when 90% of supplies, crew, etc weren't arriving until the next week). That would also explain why they only had like five backup (unreplicatable) gel packs - maybe normally they were supposed to have a million in cryo-storage, but because they were only going about 5mins max warp away from DS9 Starfleet thought 5 spares were enough and it'd get a full freezerfull when it actually went on a prolonged mission.

[FaxModem1]

It's also worth noting that the gel-packs were an experimental program, as Voyager was a bit of a test-ship, like the Prometheus was later. Note that the Defiant and the Enterprise-E didn't use the bio-neural gel packs, but the isolinear chips that the Enterprise-D used. It was probably deemed by Starfleet as a system that wasn't worth the bother, and stayed with the more reliable chips.


In regards to the station:

Technologically:
Keep in mind, on a technological level, the Cardassians used isolinear rods, while the Federation used Isolinear chips. This might be too incompatible to simply replace.

Now, politically:

Bajor owned it, and invited Starfleet. Starfleet had to accept whatever provisos the Bajoran government wanted, as they wanted to make Bajor a member. But due to Cardassian occupation, the Bajorans were rather weary of that. And there was only so much that Starfleet could send out to Bajor while dealing with other crap, like the Romulans and rebuilding from Wolf 359.

DS9 always seemed to be a frontier place for the UFP, it took them a while just to get anything functioning due to the Cardassians stripping the place.

Commence station log, Deep Space Nine, Commander Benjamin Sisko, Stardate 46388.2. At the request of the Bajoran provisional government, Starfleet has agreed to establish a Federation presence in this system following the withdrawal of Cardassian occupational forces. The first contingent of officers, including my Chief of Operations, Miles O'Brien, arrived two days ago on the Enterprise.

[Promenade]

(The place looks like it's been in the middle of a war zone. O'Brien is in black overalls with coloured shoulders whilst Sisko is in the TNG style uniform still.)
O'BRIEN: I'm told the Cardassians decided to have some fun the day they left. Four Bajorans were killed trying to protect their shops.
SISKO: Why hasn't anybody cleaned this up?
O'BRIEN: We've got all available personnel assigned to repairing primary systems, sir. The Cardassians took every component of value. We're virtually defenceless. I discussed this with Major Kira, the attaché assigned here by the Bajoran government and we decided

Do keep in mind that the UFP had more than one priority here.
One, establish a Starfleet presence there.
Two, keep friendly relations with the Bajorans.
Three, keep the Bajoran government from collapsing.
Four, make sure that the Cardassians don't take the station right back.
Five, groom Bajor for UFP membership once the previous steps are accomplished.

Then, suddenly, Six, guard the wormhole.

So, Starfleet, in a cold war with the Romulans, and apparently seeking a peace treaty with the Cardassians, sent Bajor supplies and occasional patrols to keep the area safe. Sisko and company have to try and fulfill all of the above tasks, while also dealing with problems of the week and Bajor unrest. What does Starfleet give Sisko to accomplish these tasks? About 30 Starfleet officers and crewmen, three runabouts, and occasional help from ships in the area.(For example, the Enterprise visits DS9 in one episode just to help install new replicators.)

So, Sisko has to have a base on Day 1 and onward, otherwise the Cardassians get opportunistic. While also not offending the Bajorans, who are, understandably, very wary of outsiders. This, combined with the general portrayal that Starfleet is stretched thin, means that they can't dedicate a huge presence there.

We also see that the crew are also constantly working to make Bajor have a quality of life above 'starving disease ridden ghetto.' And they have to make sure to do this while keeping the Bajorans isolationists happy. After all, the Cardassians came in and built a military refining station in orbit and raped their planet for half a century. The Federation really doesn't want to be viewed as the new boss, same as the old boss.

Years later, Starfleet is able to give Sisko the Defiant, then a year later, upgrade the station to be battle ready. And this is only when they have the Boogeyman of the Dominion around to scare up resources.

[CareerKnight]

A further justification for having the holodecks be designed on a seperate system - remember all the way back in the TNG episode where Geordi uses it to simulate the Galaxy class's designer? Remember how he had to beg to have it kept running so he could come up with the solution? What if that was picked up on by the designers/builders of newer ships and it was decided that in addition to avoiding holodecks malfunctions, a seperate system would help future engineers also be able to use the holodecks for simulations and the like without having to rely on the main power grid in case a similar situation occurred where that wouldn't be viable (or running said simulation would drain the power reserves when those were needed to be conserved as much as possible)?

That's actually probably the worst situation to have it on a separate power system. The booby trap drained all power (which is why shuttles weren't discussed at all, that and the writers probably forgot about them again) so it would have sucked the small generator for the holodeck dry long before it finished with the main reactor.

[SiskosMuthaFknPmphnd]

Is it that shocking? Their "most advanced ship" lacks a back up when its sperm bags get sick, and needs power for manual controls for its doors.

And also can't shift power from non-essentials (like Holodecks) to places that require more energy.

Makes sense if you assume Voyager was intended to be a death trap.

Admiral: "Hmm.... what the hell do we do with these people? We have a crazy captain, an asshole commander, a pilot who has no idea how fast her ship can go, the ensign who'll never be promoted because no one likes him, that cosmologist who' so arrogant he makes Wil Riker look humble by comparison.... ugh..."
Aide: "I have an idea, but you may not like it. We take all these people no one likes and put them on that experimental ship. You know, the one that uses the bags of snot for whatever reason. Anyway, put them on that ship and send them off on a mission to the Badlands. Remember that area of space where ships keep disappearing? The Equinox, that Cardassian ship, the Maquis ship. Well...."
Admiral: "I love it. Make it so!"

[Nessus]

I think you're right about that... isn't there an episode that details specifically that the Intrepid class was designed for long-term exploration beyond Federation space?

Which does make it rather lucky that Voyager ended up in just a situation for which the vessel was designed.
.

If that's what the function of it, whom ever set the goals for the Intrepid needs to shitcan whomever layed the ship out because I cannot see how going small and lower powered is the way to go for long term isolation from support. That thing should like a carrier, not a gunboat

Wait, waaaiiit. Wasn't this the original reason/justification for the Galaxy class being as big and posh as it is? I seem to remember the fluff back in ye-olde TNG day being that the Galaxy was explicitly designed for long-duration missions along and past the Federation frontier, hence it being a ginormous city-on-wheels with extra-beefy systems, lots of shuttle and cargo space, and lots of extra amenities.

So... in-universe the Intrepid is basically a cheap-ass Galaxy alternative? Same mission profile, but with all the redundancy and self-sufficiency stripped out in favor of "living off the land", because... it's too expensive to build/design a next-gen Galaxy type during wartime? Didn't they crank out more Galaxies during that time because their beefyness actually made them good dreadnoughts?

I guess it would make sense if framed as a class that wasn't supposed to do that role to nearly the same degree, but rather just something that was supposed to be a little more "long haul" than an Excelsior or Miranda or whatever. Sort of a long range patrol or recon ship rather than an explorer, but maybe that would be too "military" for traditional Trek hero ship.

I mean, real-world reason is obvious: the producers/writers wanted a ship that wouldn't seem too comfy and OP for the situation (and 'cause it's a new show, it had to be a new design anyway), but wanted a handwave for why this ship could be self-sufficient. The ship has to be self-sufficient enough to believably not die, but rubbish enough so that isolation only situationally exceeding its mission profile could still be framed as dire srs bzns.

So they fluffed up a ship that was deliberately rubbish for it's alleged job so there could be moar survival drama... then obviated that by ignoring all their own fluff about limited torpedoes, shuttles, supplies, power, repair capability, manpower, etc. except when they very specifically needed it for a very specific story, in practice making Voyager as OP self-sufficient as a Galaxy-type anyway.

[CrypticMirror]

Is it that shocking? Their "most advanced ship" lacks a back up when its sperm bags get sick, and needs power for manual controls for its doors.

And also can't shift power from non-essentials (like Holodecks) to places that require more energy.

Makes sense if you assume Voyager was intended to be a death trap.

Admiral: "Hmm.... what the hell do we do with these people? We have a crazy captain, an asshole commander, a pilot who has no idea how fast her ship can go, the ensign who'll never be promoted because no one likes him, that cosmologist who' so arrogant he makes Wil Riker look humble by comparison.... ugh..."
Aide: "I have an idea, but you may not like it. We take all these people no one likes and put them on that experimental ship. You know, the one that uses the bags of snot for whatever reason. Anyway, put them on that ship and send them off on a mission to the Badlands. Remember that area of space where ships keep disappearing? The Equinox, that Cardassian ship, the Maquis ship. Well...."
Admiral: "I love it. Make it so!"

And they would have gotten away with it too, if it hadn't been for that pesky Tom Paris. I'm sure it sounded good on paper taking a criminal renegade with them to really screw things up, but they went and took the guy whose superhero name would be The Human Swiss Army Knife!

[FakeGeekGirl]

Are you sure you're not thinking of the female Cardassian scientist who thought he was hitting on her because of all the bickering they were doing; iirc she expressed frustration at the ludicrous number of backups and redundancies Federation protocol demanded.

Which shocks the hell out of me given they don't know what a manual override is for. Maybe they need to learn about quality over quantity when it comes to safety.

[FakeGeekGirl]

I love this episode. It's the one that caused me to describe Dukat to a friend who doesn't watch the show as "Evil Batman." He has plans for everything. Except karma apparently.

I'm surprised Chuck didn't comment on how aghast Dukat was at being called out by Garak. It was like no one has ever called him on his shit before (and really they probably never have). Really, Dukat has the best faces in this episode - the look on his face when the message from his superior starts playing is amazing. It was fun seeing him get taken down a peg.