Picard Season 3

[tyrteg]

I know most Star Trek fans try their best to ignore the existence of Star Trek Online by calling it "just a video game for kids" or "just a Star Trek theme park" or "non-canon

I must admit I've never heard any of those. Certainly heard it called a gacha game though where Star Trek ships replace waifus.

Nonsense, the ships are just ̶s̶̶e̶̶x̶̶y̶̶ ̶̶d̶̶e̶̶s̶̶i̶̶r̶̶e̶̶a̶̶b̶̶l̶̶e̶̶ ̶̶b̶̶e̶̶a̶̶u̶̶t̶̶i̶̶f̶̶u̶̶l̶̶ ̶ eye-pleasing tools to f̶̶a̶̶n̶̶t̶̶a̶̶s̶̶z̶̶i̶̶z̶̶e̶̶ ̶̶a̶̶b̶̶o̶̶u̶̶t̶̶ ̶̶s̶̶l̶̶e̶̶e̶̶p̶̶ ̶̶c̶̶u̶̶d̶̶d̶̶l̶̶e̶ play with. I mean, just look at this nasty little bitch in need of some spanking...



But in all seriousness, everyone should give STO a chance. It's truely free to play and even though high gear content is lockboxed behind paywalls, you can get "through" the game without dropping money just fine. In regards to the storylines of the episodic arcs, some are golden in the good way, some are golden in the bad way and things get a bit over the top at times, but overall, it's interesting and involving stuff. Grind isn't too horrible and let's be honest, which actual Star Trek fan could pass by moments like this and not be intrigued...

Ive sadly heard all of the derisive dismissals of STO. Many of them on this Forum.
Of course in the end my love for the smooth, sexy curves of those beautiful Romulan Warbirds wins over any uninformed hate.



The main reason I mentioned it here was Winter writing about missing a DS9 follow-up. And while I'm not saying the books are bad - I'd say there is still a difference between reading about say - Odo and Kira and hearing René Auberjois and Nana Visitor voicing those characters in-game and for once being a part of the crew. Being a part of the adventure - instead of just being an observer.

[stryke]

Did try the season 8 books myself, but yeah they started alright and then rather went off the rails. The Section 31 tie in event being especially bad and what was got me to stop reading. Did like the jem'hadar main character though.

Dark Passions came out around the same time and was what convinced me to give up on Trek books entirely. If I wanted to read Trek slash smut then it's easily findable for free on the fanfiction sites, and in better quality too. For the unaware it was Ds9 Mirror Universe what happened to the Voyager lot. Seven is an Obsidian Order asset rather than Borg, and that's the only interesting idea in there. Well I guess unless you want to find out just how filthy Risa gets in the Mirror Universe. (The answer is: Very)

Weird event that Section 31 thing now i think about it. By far the best one of them by miles was the Voyager effort surprisingly. Had both a nicely different sci-fi concept than the usual, and nicely recontextualised what was a throwaway moment in the show to something much more interesting.

Also while it wasn't apart of the season 8 imprint officially if I remember right, Stitch in Time by Andrew J Robinson is absolutely canon, and should be read by absolutely everyone.

Nonsense, the ships are just ̶s̶̶e̶̶x̶̶y̶̶ ̶̶d̶̶e̶̶s̶̶i̶̶r̶̶e̶̶a̶̶b̶̶l̶̶e̶̶ ̶̶b̶̶e̶̶a̶̶u̶̶t̶̶i̶̶f̶̶u̶̶l̶̶ ̶ eye-pleasing tools to f̶̶a̶̶n̶̶t̶̶a̶̶s̶̶z̶̶i̶̶z̶̶e̶̶ ̶̶a̶̶b̶̶o̶̶u̶̶t̶̶ ̶̶s̶̶l̶̶e̶̶e̶̶p̶̶ ̶̶c̶̶u̶̶d̶̶d̶̶l̶̶e̶ play with. I mean, just look at this nasty little bitch in need of some spanking...

That amused greatly

[clearspira]

I gotta say, the TNG/DS9 Warbird has always looked terrible to me.



All of that empty space is just so wasteful. And it does that thing that they did with the Cardassian warship of just having one gun on the front. Maybe that's why the Federation is so powerful in-universe what with their ability to... fire in multiple directions.

Say what you like about Nemesis, its prop and ship design is some of the best we've ever seen.

[Madner Kami]

I gotta say, the TNG/DS9 Warbird has always looked terrible to me.



All of that empty space is just so wasteful. And it does that thing that they did with the Cardassian warship of just having one gun on the front. Maybe that's why the Federation is so powerful in-universe what with their ability to... fire in multiple directions.

Say what you like about Nemesis, its prop and ship design is some of the best we've ever seen.

Much of that is budget-related or terrible communication with the art-departement. Or the departement not giving a damn in regards to the directions given. You got multiple occasions where even the hero-ships do stupid stuff from stupid locations and the D'Deridex suffered from exactly that. This opening? Not a torpedo-ramp or a beam- or bolt-emitter at all. Canonically, that is the ship's main deflector... You know where the actual beam weaponry was supposed to come from? It's eyes. Yes, you read that right, it's "eyes". See these nobs, located on both sides of the "head"?



Those. Pictures like these are much more accurate to what it was supposed to look like:





Also, that huge empty, aka negative space, that's actually kind of a "cargo-compartement", for lack of a better word. The ship was designed by the serie's designers, to be modular and that negative space was where those modules were supposed to go, similar to the "rollbar" on the Miranda or the "backpack" of the Nebulas. It just ended up never being used and becoming kinda iconic the way it was. Gawd, I'm such a nerd.

I do agree though, that the Valdore/Norexan is a massive visual upgrade, not in the least thanks to it's visual agility and the natural movement and mobility that both these and the Souvereign bring to the classically rather stiff fights of Star Trek. The way they swoop into the fight is just so tremendously eye-pleasing and justifies their "warbird"-moniker like nothing before.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I don't think there was really an issue with Worf's makeup as the klingons in Discovery were specifically ones that didn't get subject to the mutation on Praxis and aren't proxied to the ones we see in TOS or subsequent generations in which the mutation wore off.

[clearspira]

I don't think there was really an issue with Worf's makeup as the klingons in Discovery were specifically ones that didn't get subject to the mutation on Praxis and aren't proxied to the ones we see in TOS or subsequent generations in which the mutation wore off.

The issue with the Discovery Klingons is that they look NOTHING like any other Klingon. As in ''these cannot be from the same species.'' Please read this article on Ex Astris Scientia:

https://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/inco ... ingons.htm

If you don't want to do that though, I will leave you with this photo:



This thing doesn't look like a TNG Klingon. This thing doesn't look like a TOS Klingon. It doesn't even look like Neanderthal-Worf from ''Genesis''. It looks like a humanoid Xenomorph.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I don't think there was really an issue with Worf's makeup as the klingons in Discovery were specifically ones that didn't get subject to the mutation on Praxis and aren't proxied to the ones we see in TOS or subsequent generations in which the mutation wore off.

The issue with the Discovery Klingons is that they look NOTHING like any other Klingon. As in ''these cannot be from the same species.'' Please read this article on Ex Astris Scientia:

https://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/inco ... ingons.htm

If you don't want to do that though, I will leave you with this photo:



This thing doesn't look like a TNG Klingon. This thing doesn't look like a TOS Klingon. It doesn't even look like Neanderthal-Worf from ''Genesis''. It looks like a humanoid Xenomorph.

It's a consistent development, save for you as usual picking the most obscure photo you can find to serve a basis of juxtaposition, but also understayed by the 1980 Klingon designed that was rather consistent well into 2005 w/ Enterprise. They did get an order to reel the costuming in for S2



In which case there is in-universe explanation what not while effectively resembling the familiar klingons more.

[clearspira]

I don't think there was really an issue with Worf's makeup as the klingons in Discovery were specifically ones that didn't get subject to the mutation on Praxis and aren't proxied to the ones we see in TOS or subsequent generations in which the mutation wore off.

The issue with the Discovery Klingons is that they look NOTHING like any other Klingon. As in ''these cannot be from the same species.'' Please read this article on Ex Astris Scientia:

https://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/inco ... ingons.htm

If you don't want to do that though, I will leave you with this photo:



This thing doesn't look like a TNG Klingon. This thing doesn't look like a TOS Klingon. It doesn't even look like Neanderthal-Worf from ''Genesis''. It looks like a humanoid Xenomorph.

It's a consistent development, save for you as usual picking the most obscure photo you can find to serve a basis of juxtaposition, but also understayed by the 1980 Klingon designed that was rather consistent well into 2005 w/ Enterprise. They did get an order to reel the costuming in for S2



In which case there is in-universe explanation what not while effectively resembling the familiar klingons more.

Those two women look nothing alike. I guess she did a Micheal Jackson hatchet job on her own skin colour then? And the fact that the costuming was ''reeled in'' says a lot about what the writers thought of this make-up change.
Like I said, read the article. It takes the in-universe explanation you speak of and proves why it cannot work when you apply any logic to it at all.

[McAvoy]

I gotta say, the TNG/DS9 Warbird has always looked terrible to me.



All of that empty space is just so wasteful. And it does that thing that they did with the Cardassian warship of just having one gun on the front. Maybe that's why the Federation is so powerful in-universe what with their ability to... fire in multiple directions.

Say what you like about Nemesis, its prop and ship design is some of the best we've ever seen.

Much of that is budget-related or terrible communication with the art-departement. Or the departement not giving a damn in regards to the directions given. You got multiple occasions where even the hero-ships do stupid stuff from stupid locations and the D'Deridex suffered from exactly that. This opening? Not a torpedo-ramp or a beam- or bolt-emitter at all. Canonically, that is the ship's main deflector... You know where the actual beam weaponry was supposed to come from? It's eyes. Yes, you read that right, it's "eyes". See these nobs, located on both sides of the "head"?



Those. Pictures like these are much more accurate to what it was supposed to look like:





Also, that huge empty, aka negative space, that's actually kind of a "cargo-compartement", for lack of a better word. The ship was designed by the serie's designers, to be modular and that negative space was where those modules were supposed to go, similar to the "rollbar" on the Miranda or the "backpack" of the Nebulas. It just ended up never being used and becoming kinda iconic the way it was. Gawd, I'm such a nerd.

I do agree though, that the Valdore/Norexan is a massive visual upgrade, not in the least thanks to it's visual agility and the natural movement and mobility that both these and the Souvereign bring to the classically rather stiff fights of Star Trek. The way they swoop into the fight is just so tremendously eye-pleasing and justifies their "warbird"-moniker like nothing before.

One of the issues that we have with Romulan ships and Klingon ships is that a winged ship with a head jutting well forward is common between the two. Never mind majority of their ships green.

I never minded the Romulan Warbird. Yes the ship is huge with too much empty space. Not even sure if those two halves are habitable either.

My head cannon for those ships is that it was done for intimidationand also needed it for the quantum singularity core it uses. Kinda would have been cool if SFX was up to the task of showing such a thing in the middle of the vessel.

Fans early on did make a ship where the bottom half was removed. It does look better without it too. IMO. But I get it, at the time going for a double hull ship would make it look unique in TNG.

Romulans always seemed like a paper tiger. Like they were the lesser of three powers.

[Madner Kami]

I gotta say, the TNG/DS9 Warbird has always looked terrible to me.



All of that empty space is just so wasteful. And it does that thing that they did with the Cardassian warship of just having one gun on the front. Maybe that's why the Federation is so powerful in-universe what with their ability to... fire in multiple directions.

Say what you like about Nemesis, its prop and ship design is some of the best we've ever seen.

Much of that is budget-related or terrible communication with the art-departement. Or the departement not giving a damn in regards to the directions given. You got multiple occasions where even the hero-ships do stupid stuff from stupid locations and the D'Deridex suffered from exactly that. This opening? Not a torpedo-ramp or a beam- or bolt-emitter at all. Canonically, that is the ship's main deflector... You know where the actual beam weaponry was supposed to come from? It's eyes. Yes, you read that right, it's "eyes". See these nobs, located on both sides of the "head"?



Those. Pictures like these are much more accurate to what it was supposed to look like:





Also, that huge empty, aka negative space, that's actually kind of a "cargo-compartement", for lack of a better word. The ship was designed by the serie's designers, to be modular and that negative space was where those modules were supposed to go, similar to the "rollbar" on the Miranda or the "backpack" of the Nebulas. It just ended up never being used and becoming kinda iconic the way it was. Gawd, I'm such a nerd.

I do agree though, that the Valdore/Norexan is a massive visual upgrade, not in the least thanks to it's visual agility and the natural movement and mobility that both these and the Souvereign bring to the classically rather stiff fights of Star Trek. The way they swoop into the fight is just so tremendously eye-pleasing and justifies their "warbird"-moniker like nothing before.

One of the issues that we have with Romulan ships and Klingon ships is that a winged ship with a head jutting well forward is common between the two. Never mind majority of their ships green.

I never minded the Romulan Warbird. Yes the ship is huge with too much empty space. Not even sure if those two halves are habitable either.

My head cannon for those ships is that it was done for intimidationand also needed it for the quantum singularity core it uses. Kinda would have been cool if SFX was up to the task of showing such a thing in the middle of the vessel.

Fans early on did make a ship where the bottom half was removed. It does look better without it too. IMO. But I get it, at the time going for a double hull ship would make it look unique in TNG.

Romulans always seemed like a paper tiger. Like they were the lesser of three powers.

Haha, even more indepth nerd-knowledge incoming:

Classic TOS, only one klingon ship appears on-screen, the D7/K'Tinga. Also, only one romulan ship appears, the Bird-of-Prey. They also reuse D7s for romulan-ships by painting the bird-motif onto the lower hull, just like the Bird-of-Prey had.

Movies come. The Motion Picture recycles/updates the D7 to the K'Tinga. Search for Spock comes along. A ship is designed for the main antagonist. It carries a bird-theme. It will be called the Bird-of-Prey. And then the executives decides that the main antagonist will be changed to a Klingon, rather than *drumroll* a Romulan. Yes, you read that right. The Bird of Prey, the only green ship with a feather-desgin on it's wings in the Klingon Fleet, is actually a romulan ship.

Oh and as for:

I never minded the Romulan Warbird. Yes the ship is huge with too much empty space. Not even sure if those two halves are habitable either.

When they started to develop models for Star Trek (TOS) the designers set up some very basic rules, which the canon largely adhered to (with a surprisingly low amount of deviation in hindsight, as it basically took till DS9 that we saw the first hero-ship breaking the rules). One of those rules was, that there needs to be line-of-sight between the warp-nacelles (originally nacelles always needed to appear in pairs, but they deviated from that fairly early on in beta canon). Keeping that in mind, when the D'Deridex was designed, this was still a basically unbroken maxim, hence the design as is (plus the multi-mission thing I mentioned earlier).

A hell of a lot of thought went into the ships of Star Trek and whenever something appears to be wierd or "off", then there's a good reason for that oddity, which usually just got lost between design and final execution.