posted
One could also argue that fleets operating in different areas of space had different classes of ships assigned to them. The distances involved may have been relatively long, so if a prewar emphasis had been on giving new ships to the 6th Fleet on the Klingon border, then the 9th Fleet on the Cardassian front wouldn't have new ships even after several years of fighting. There simply wouldn't be such a lull in combat that those ships could be flown to the other theater of operations.
All the most modern ships at 9th Fleet disposal could also have been expended in the unseen first three months of fighting. After that, this secondary battlefront was not replenished because the Dominion was threatening more vital targets like Earth itself. (Note that DS9 had no real strategic value as long as the wormhole was closed, which it was for most of the war - by the whims of the Prophets if not by the minefield).
Some of the missing ships could also indeed be mission-specific, explaining their invisibility - the missions of, say, Challenger or Intrepid classes were not ones the 9th Fleet would have performed. However, I think most of Starfleet's vessels are multipurpose enough that they would have been included in the big assaults anyway.
On a variation of that theme, perhaps the more modern "BoBW" generation vessels were too fast to be flown in formation with old Excelsiors and Mirandas, which is why Starfleet never wasted them for such missions. Every fleet of course had the big battleships of Galaxy or Nebula class, since there was no slower alternative to them (Starfleet not having built anything that big and strong in the previous, slower generation of starships) - but the 6th Fleet could have had New Orleanses and Cheyennes to go with them, instead of Excelsiors and Mirandas.
posted
I have to take issue with the strategic importance of DS9, though. Even with the wormhole closed, the station is still one of the closest (if not the closest) outposts to Cardassia Prime the Federation has.
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posted
"The distances involved may have been relatively long, so if a prewar emphasis had been on giving new ships to the 6th Fleet on the Klingon border, then the 9th Fleet on the Cardassian front wouldn't have new ships even after several years of fighting."
That argument is based on the idea that the 8,000 ly of the Federation cannot be traversed in weeks, which itself is based on the idea that ships cannot possibly traverse this distance faster than 1000c or so. A more obvious explanation for the size of the Federation is that warp speeds vary.
Besides, we know that the Cardassian and the Klingon borders are roughly 200 ly away ("Trials and Tribble-ations") and that the journey is merely "a long one" (Way of the Warrior) that at times can be quite short ("The House of Quark"). All these references could quite easily refer to different sections of the Klingon border, especially with the WOTW and THOQ discrepancy.
"All the most modern ships at 9th Fleet disposal could also have been expended in the unseen first three months of fighting. After that, this secondary battlefront was not replenished because the Dominion was threatening more vital targets like Earth itself."
This is a better reason, but Earth wasn't in danger until much later, whereas Cardassia and the DS9 area were the source of the problem. I agree that a good part of the fleet would be diverted to protect Earth because of its political value.
However, statistically, there shouldn't be more than two or three such ships in every fleet. There were only, what, three Intrepids in the early 2370s? It makes sense that the most commonly seen ships in all the series are the main battlefleet among the explorers. How else could the Federation survive next to the other militaries with a similar level of technology?
There might be a few specialized super-warships (Intrepid, Defiant, Yeager?), along with a few that could have been pulled out of mothballs (Akira/Steamrunner/Sabre?). However, implying that the super-fleets are never where the main action is (even during the final invasion of Cardassia!) is based more in the need to satisfy fanboy perceptions of what ships are kewl.
"On a variation of that theme, perhaps the more modern "BoBW" generation vessels were too fast to be flown in formation with old Excelsiors and Mirandas, which is why Starfleet never wasted them for such missions."
Why would a ship be unable to move slow? We've seen everything from the oldest Mirandas and Excelsiors to brand-new Galaxies fly in formation. Besides, the older ships could simply fly faster; it wouldn't make a difference as the relative speeds would remain the same, regardless if you're all accelerating at 1/4 impulse or 1/2 impulse.
Boris
[ April 29, 2002, 22:59: Message edited by: Boris ]
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posted
Good points, but in some cases not quite what I meant. For the first issue, I didn't mean it would take years to travel from the Klingon front to the Cardassian one. Rather, it would take a couple of weeks - and for several months in a row, Starfleet would not have a couple of weeks to spare to move the ships. Not "just in case" anyway, not when withdrawing the ships from a currently peaceful section of the border could expose a core system to invasion.
As for keeping the newest ships all grouped up in one or two key locations, that's pretty much what the naval powers of Earth have done in major wars. Navies are weapons of intimidation, and the biggest guns are often held back as a deterrent. They are far less frightening when on the battlefield.
No objection, though, to the point that modern ships ought to have been present in at least two types of operations we saw in DS9: a preplanned invasion of strategic significance, like that of Chin'toka (where top ships should be emphasized and older ones skipped if anything), and an all-out, desperate, last-straw battle like that of Cardassia Prime (where ships of all types should be present).
As for the speed argument, we already saw that the Dominion could monitor Starfleet movements from a distance - they could e.g. tell when a fleet had left DS9 and for which target. Could this significant advantage be beaten by increasing fleet speed? If the answer is at least "well, maybe", then it would be criminal to send out fleets that are slowed down by the presence of older ships.
If the answer is a resounding "no", however, then by all means have the Intrepids moving at one-third available speed - apparently, big fleets fight better than small formations or individual vessels, according to Starfleet doctrine anyway. Might be similar to the time when guns dominated the seas. The side that brings more of the barrels to bear at the crucial moment shall win.
If the Dominion could indeed spot Starfleet movements about 5 ly away, and even detect cloaked vessels as they enter the sector (although that special platform was destroyed by Dax), then fleet speed would probably be irrelevant. Better send out a fleet moving at warp 2 and consisting of 10,000 ships than send out a warp 9.7 fleet of 100 ships, a warp 8 fleet of 2,000 ships and a warp 2 fleet of 7,900 ships... But if the enemy sensors aren't that good, then the latter approach is more sensible.
'Course, it means that our heroes will never see the 100 top starships of the warp 9.7 fleet, since their tough little ship moves at less than warp 9.5 and thus has to hang around with the warp 8 bunch...
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posted
quote:Originally posted by The_Tom, albeit two pages ago The Odyssey and Galaxy appeared in TotP, the latter being severely damaged but neither was conclusively destroyed.
The Odysseywas conclusively destroyed. A Jem'Hadar fighter rammed its deflector dish, sending a large piece of debris careening into the starboard warp nacelle, causing a catastrophic explosion that reduced the ship to its component atomic particles as the assembled runabouts watched, in the episode "The Jem'Hadar." Didn't seem very open ended to me...
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Timo you just described the problem with the United States in the 1920's and 1930's with their 'Standards' battleships. All battleships under US control had a maximum speed of 21-22 knots. This made a uniform fleet, whereas the other powers had a scattered fleet of 23 knots, 25 knots, 30 knots and 33 knots. This meant while the enmy fleet had to stay at either 23 knots to stay with the slower ships or split up and use the speed as an advantage. However the US fleet stayed together, and can fight other fleets on their own terms.
posted
As for withdrawing the fleet from the Klingon border: the peace treaty had been signed and wasn't broken afterwards. It was in the Klingon interest to cooperate with the Federation against the Dominion. I think leaving just Picard on the Ent-E would be enough for this kind of patrol mission because we know he'll broker every agreement and never die.
As for the speed -- it's always the newest and the latest ships that have high speeds (Prometheus, Sovereign (wasn't it Warp 9.95 according to Captain's Chair?), Intrepid). Even the Defiant's limitation seems to be merely a result of a botched SIF field (which we know was a problem in "Shattered Mirror"), and it's possible that the warp core can indeed generate Warp 9.982 power.
All of the other ships in the observed fleets are limited to Warp 9.x or so. The hypothetical courier ships exist only because Rick Sternbach is picky about his personal canon, and doesn't believe in occassionally fast warp speeds.
The Wolf 359 ships, being in the generation of Galaxys and Nebulas, are likely to share their speed limitations (which indeeed are the limitations of every ship in the Dominion fleet according to the DS9TM).
We could easily have a fleet of Sovereigns/Intrepids/Prometheii moving faster (and we know that a couple of Prometheii would be built by the time of "Endgame"). I don't recall how warp speed affects the sensors, but I would guess that a bunch of ships at high warp = high spatial distortion = more easily detectable. Also, they've just been seen far too rarely to be numerous, and official sources support the idea that it takes a while for the new ships to, er, multiply.
Boris
[ April 30, 2002, 08:19: Message edited by: Boris ]
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quote:Originally posted by Boris: As for the speed -- it's always the newest and the latest ships that have high speeds (Prometheus, Sovereign (wasn't it Warp 9.95 according to Captain's Chair?), Intrepid). Even the Defiant's limitation seems to be merely a result of a botched SIF field (which we know was a problem in "Shattered Mirror"), and it's possible that the warp core can indeed generate Warp 9.982 power.
Captain's Chair? The novel? That isn't canon. Plus I'm betting the Sovereign's just a bit faster, as size seems to be reflect speed in Starfleet.
We know SIF was one of the Defiant class's trouble spots, but nothing ever said it had anything to do with limiting her maximum warp speed. We do conclusivly know that her maximum speed was clearly stated as being 9.5 in "The Sound of her Voice", there's no use arguing around it. Starship Spotter is again, not canon.
I'm still kinda shocked over the statement of Yeagers and Intrepids being "super warships".
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posted
No, Captain's Chair the CD-ROM resource. It's as canon as the Encyclopedia.
Speaking of ship speeds, for some reason, I liked it better when ships only went up to 9.6 or so with the ship coming apart at 9.9. It seems all the new ships just keep pushing it further and further until the average viewer has no idea what the big difference is between 9.997 and 9.999...besides, writers will always dictate how fast the ship will really go. I think it was Voyager that started this whole stupid max. warp speed measured by the hundredths and thousandths.
posted
Yes you are right, when someone yell "Go to Warp 9.999999 now!" is not quite as effective as "Go to Warp 45 now!" I aslways think that they should have stayed with the original Warp scale. It'd make more sense, plus then you won't have a barrier.
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posted
In "The Sound of Her Voice", O'Brien says that the ship starts to shake itself apart at speeds above Warp 9. They divert phaser power to the SIF field in order to allow for Warp 9.5, but they never say it's the maximum speed. It's simply the maximum speed allowed by the given efficiency of the SIF. If you increased SIF efficiency, a greater speed is conceviable.
Hence, the only canon limitation we know of is the SIF field, meaning that the Defiant could probably go faster after a major fix (and Starship Spotter does state that subsequent modifications allowed for Warp 9.982). Since only the show is canon, every other book (except for fandom publications) has only the official status, though some books are better informed than the others and should be ranked according to their reliability.
The Intrepid has been confirmed as a "troubleshooter", a ship which matches the Galaxy class in its armament according to the official article.
The Yeager uses the same primary hull so it might be related.
Boris
[ April 30, 2002, 16:51: Message edited by: Boris ]
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quote:though some books are better informed than the others and should be ranked according to their reliability.
Yeah, and Star Ship Spotter isn't a very reliable book IMO. Just check the phaser counts for example.
[ April 30, 2002, 16:18: Message edited by: Spike ]
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But there's no need to treat books as either completely valid or completely invalid. You adopt what fits the canon and correct what doesn't. Which is better:
"Hi Pocket Books, thanks for letting me write a book, but I don't care about all of this consistency you're trying to establish and maintain between your books and between the books and the show, my pals consider only the show to be canon with a few exceptions, so we'll just discard all of your stuff and include all of ours in my reference book."
or
"Hi Pocket Books, I've been following what you've been doing, and decided that this has to be rejected because it doesn't fit the canon, while this can be accepted."
I'm just citing the way things actually work. The writers cannot review the novels because they don't have the time -- hence, only the show is canon (Furthermore, how much sense does it make to give Okuda and Sternbach the status of staff writers by making their work automatically canon? It would be nice if they were staff writers, but unfortunately they're not.)
However, that won't stop the writers from adopting a few references from the Encyclopedia, the TMs, TAS, and other things with the Star Trek label on them.
Pocket Books, on the other hand, has been trying to maintain consistency within its products and the show; Alex and Mojo have already told us that licensed Pocket Books sources need to be taken into account for every new book. So why not help out by having ready-made theories that explain whatever can be explained in the licensed sources, just in case someone else happens to write a Trek book?
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