Characters, Plot, and Setting (both time and place)... are equally important to a good story. All stories have characters, they aren't always human, or even animate, but there is something within the story that has it's actions described. Perhaps it's only a short poetic narrative about the wind, but the wind is still the character. Plot is also important, if nothing happens then there is no story. Setting is the final piece which sets up a story. If you have good characters and plot for a 1880's western you don't want them in 20th century new york--- it's not natural.
Characters, Plot, and Setting have to be worked on equally and together because they are codependent.
-------------------- Later, J _ _ _ _ _ ___ _ _ _ _ _ The Last Person to post in the late Voyager Forum. Bashing both Voyager, Enterprise, and "The Bun" in one glorious post.
posted
Watch a Qunetin Tarantino movie to see how a story can be driven by the characters, and the plot is just there to give them a reason to interact. Granted, the plots tend to be rather complicated, but they still aren't nearly as important as the characters.
Registered: Mar 1999
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Jonah seems to think that because Star Trek is a low-budget/low-care show with mistakes, one must fix it before treating it seriously. However, I'd argue that fixing it removes its essence, even when it comes down to the details.
If the essence of Star Trek is to be unrealistic and cheesy at times, why ignore the possibility that registry numbers are as meaningful as ship names? The suffices added to some registries support this notion, and it doesn't take a lot of imagination to suppose that in some cases, Starfleet would allow numbers to be reused without suffices. That's what Starfleet is about -- it can do things that regular navies cannot.
Similarily, let's say you're describing Jim Phelps from MI. The essence of Jim Phelps is that he always does his mission, no matter what. He has the option of not accepting a mission, but he does it nevertheless, without any real feelings or moral quandries. It's unrealistic, but that's what Jim Phelps is about. If you give Phelps moral quandries, he won't be Jim Phelps any longer.
That's why MI2 was a bit of a dissapointment -- suddenly we have Ethan Hunt having a real romance, as opposed to mere fake playacting. That's also why the fate of Jim Phelps makes sense in the MI movie -- once you decide to blow the formula and show the characters behind the scenes, you've got to ask the question of what kind of person you'd have to be to behave like Jim Phelps did in the old show.
posted
Noooo.... I know Star Trek is a high-budget show where the focus is on what's happening and who's doing it, and the VFX shots are there to connect the live-action scenes and put them in context. Much of the budget is sunk into said VFX shots, and there is a heirarchy of importance I ascribe to the data contained therein...
F'r instance, to the layman, all a stock shot in TNG of the Enterprise rendezvousing with an Excelsior-class ship does is show that Our Heroes are meeting up with another ship in furtherance of whatever's going on (compare notes, transfer passengers, form a task force, whatever...). What ship it actually is almost always has nothing to do with the story. Any uses of ship names in said moments are fluff, icing, and registries are less important still.
The only instances I can think of where a registry number has been pointed out onscreen are in "Star Trek: The Motion Picture", with the four ships involved in the Epsilon 9 comm traffic; in "Where Silence Has Lease", with Riker recognizing the Yamato from the (erroneous) registry on her ventral saucer; in "Hope and Fear", with the Voyager's bridge crew being puzzled by the fake Dauntless' registry; and in "Yesterday's Enterprise", when Tasha read off what the transponder was telling her about the other ship.
Three episodes out of over six hundred, plus one movie out of nine. That's how important registries are to the settings and plots -- occasionally at best.
I don't think they're a bunch of cheapskates who don't care. I think they're a bunch of busy people who have things more important to what they're working on to worry about.
And forgive me if for some reason I feel Starfleet would not actually just slap some random numbers on their ships, whether they'd been used before or not, and maybe tack a letter on to the ones with these names, and all sorts of other crap that results in bookeeping nightmares. I apologise most sincerely for maintaining that they'd actually employ a system that makes logical sense and remains consistent. Maybe I'm just wacky, but for some reason I just don't think chaos theory should be applied to assigning starship registries.
We know the boom mike operator wasn't really standing there in the Rio Grande's cockpit. Why should we suspend the same critical thinking skills when we see two different classes of ship bearing the name Melbourne and possessing the same registry?
--Jonah
-------------------- "That's what I like about these high school girls, I keep getting older, they stay the same age."
--David "Woody" Wooderson, Dazed and Confused
Registered: Feb 2001
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posted
I agree that some things must be ignored. Stock footage, for example -- you can't tell me that the Enterprise is going to fly by at exactly the same angle so many times. Here, we have to allow for the possibility of something slightly different happening every time. I also mentioned actors playing different characters, and would add to that lips moving in English even when the language is alien yet universally translated.
However, registry numbers don't fit the bill. They're obviously not chaotic, and I never said they were, but they're not perfectly regular either -- they follow a system with exceptions. That kind of thing is physically possible and reasonable, so we cannot ignore it, at least not if we're analyzing things.
One such exception are the suffices on the Enterprises and a few other ships such as the Relativity. I'm arguing that other such exceptions are registries that are reused without suffices, picked in advance, or reserved for a certain types of ships. Starfleet is sufficiently computerized to allow for some randomness in its numbers -- all you need to have is a database matching current names with current registries.
How hard is that? Cops must have something like that to allow for registries such as "I LOVE NY" or "NCC-1701". This slight looseness is consistent with the nature of Starfleet, which is not a military in the usual sense of the word. It's consistent with the practice of suffixed registries. It's the kind of system that works for this particular show, given that you can't control everything that's going on onscreen.
posted
I wonder if we're over-analysing. I grew up with the FASA notion that registry batches were reserved for certain ships of certain types.
I then realized as I became more interested in canon Trek to see what was actually happening within only the context of the shows and movies.
At this point I'm content with registries being for the most part starting small when Starfleet was founded and increasing in number as time goes on and more ships are commissioned.
There are exceptions of course, but if you look through a list of the canon registries we know and isolate the ones that don't increase chronologically, there really aren't that many.
From that I'm happy with the general rule that hull numbers are assigned to ships as they are constructed.
I'm also happy with the few exceptions which are there. I don't need to know the circumstances of Grissom's comparatively low registry for the time. I could make something up, but that's just a small exception and I leave it that there is an explanation, but I don't have to know it.
I don't bang my head against the wall everytime I see 'Brittain' clearly marked on the ship. I understand it's an error and just wait until the scene changes and 'Brattain' is shown written behind the captain's chair.
I don't think there's a point in making sure the ENTIRE registry sceme fits. It's clear enough from 90% of the known examples how the system works, Do we need to justify EVERY exception?
quote:Originally posted by Boris: One such exception are the suffices on the Enterprises and a few other ships such as the Relativity.
The Relativity being a real Starfleet ship now?
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
29th century future Starfleet, sure. I'm not at all sure what "real" means when we're talking about trans-temporal multi-universe things, but, I guess.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
At least the original Enterprise and the Enterprise-D do not have any other registry. As far as we know there has been no Enterprise before Kirks (except the NX of course). And Garretts Enterprise has been destroyed nearly twenty years before the commission of Picards.
With the -A, the case is clear: Yorktown has been renamed to Enterprise-A.
With the -B, there is a problem. Ships usually get a name when there keel is laied and this is some time prior thir launch. So when the -B has been launched in 2293 (which was just one year after the Khitomer conference where the -A was still active) her keel has to be laid in 92 or even 91. I'm not sure but I don't think that any Navy on this Planet would have two vessel with the same name at the same time. So the -B has been laid as U.S.S. Notenterprise and got therefore a registry higher than 2000.
With the -C, it may be the same as above but I'm not sure. It depends on when the -B has been destroyed or decommissioned.
With the -E, it is similar to the -B. Just one year after the destruction of the -D there was a new Enterprise. Not even the Federation could build such a powerful vessel in one year. Because I think most prototypes will be built in pairs, the -E was originally laid as NCC-75001 (when we take 75000 for the Sovereigns registry and the Enterprise as her sister).
-------------------- "Ah, Romulans. I like them best burning and in pieces."
Registered: Nov 2002
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posted
It would even make sense to me that a Galaxy Class in the making was registered at the time as something like NCC-71512 and at some point before the final skinning was applied, an admiral says, "hey, let's name that one the next Enterprise", so they change the hull to 1701-D. That would explain the B, C and E as well.
Work on the Sovereign Class Development Project began in TNG season 2 according to the Starship Spotter. I don't know how many treat the book as canon, but I'm willing to unless it contains contardictory information.
posted
I'm wondering what type of ship the Sovereign actually is? I assume it is (like all Enterprises) an Explorer but why has it Quantum torps, 13 type XII phasers and such a powerful shielding. I think massive battleships are expensive... I think that massive explorers are also expensive. So when you mix them together they are no more effordable. And don't tell me they have no money in the Federation. If they really haven't, they easily could build a whole fleet of Galaxys and Sovereigns.
For me its a Battleship!
-------------------- "Ah, Romulans. I like them best burning and in pieces."
Registered: Nov 2002
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posted
Stand back everyone! It's a baseless opinion in bold!
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Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
When they are publishing the next TM we probably find out what she is really...
The only scientific analysis the Enterprise-E has made was the scan of the neutral zone in FC. Even a Type 9 shuttle could scan for the dust concentration.
Okay maybe its no real battleship at all. Graham Kennedy calls it "Enhanced Deterrence Explorer". Probably its really that BB/Explorer hybrid. All Enterprises we have seen were explorers but had a strong tactical suite. Some kinda Battleexplorer?
But it would be much to expensive..
Markus
-------------------- "Ah, Romulans. I like them best burning and in pieces."
Registered: Nov 2002
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Ok, small problem with this vis a vis Starfleet...
-------------------- "I am an almost extinct breed, an old-fashioned gentleman, which means I can be a cast-iron son-of-a-bitch when it suits me." --Jubal Harshaw
Registered: Feb 2002
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