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Originally posted by Sol System:
Wasn't the basic gimmick in "Minefield" a minefield full of cloaked mines? I mean, sure, you could do a different episode with a different gimmick, but as it stands the whole episode depends on that one.

(So I guess what I'm getting at is that I'm not sure what you mean by "unnecessary" in this context. For the episode that exists, having a cloaking device is a necessity for the story, since were the mines visible they would have approached the planet, if they did at all, in a different way. Now that could be changed, and you'd have a different episode, maybe better, maybe worse. But the cloak wasn't just a background detail in the story, is the thing.)

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You know, you are absolutely correct. I'm not sure what I was thinking when I posted that.

RE: Holotechnology
I think it's become clear that it's really not that complicated. It's all over the place even in the 22nd century. If you believe the animated episode "The Practical Joker," (which I do) they had it on the E-nil. Sure, Janeway said in "Flashback" that they didn't have them aboard starships in the 2290s, but that could just be because that was a period of increased military rigidity in Starfleet. (Less creature comforts, in accordance with Nick Meyer's production design ethos during the films.) I actually just reviewed "Encounter at Farpoint," and nothing really seemed to imply that it was new technology; just that the E-D's holodeck was more advanced than previous models.

-MMoM

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The flaws we find most objectionable in others are often those we recognize in ourselves.