OT: Revised Edition Star Trek

[narf poit chez BOOM]

In the Space & Beyond thread, I got the idea of revising ST to be consistant, realistic and make sense, taking what we wanted from the shows and leaving what we didn't want, out of a discussion about the inconsistancies of ST.
http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/threads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=381643

At least a couple people showed interest in the idea, so I made a new thread. Posts are qouted below.


Narf:
Hey, anyone want to create a rational and consistant ST universe? Start with the earliest episodes and work forwards, picking things that make sense and whatnot?

Say, someone with bandwidth and storage hosting a wiki?

First proposal: Klingons are nasty, backstabbing sabatuers, like in early ST. But, since they look to much like humans, brow ridges are in. All black is out, since...Not enough sarcasm.

Second proposal: Romulons, like we saw them in the first place, are honorable, dedicated conquerers, who happen to like tactics, stealth and espionage. Naturally, they are also cousins to the Vulcans.

More proposals: Pon far: Out the daar. Yeah, I know it's spelt door. But that doesn't rhyme. It does nothing but turn the vulcans into savages, which is what the're not supposed to be.

The Prime Directive: Did Kirk ever act like there was a prime directive in the first ones? No. But it makes sense, in a limited way, so some sort of common-sense non-interferance directive. Not 'Stay Out Entirely', but 'Stay Out Unless You Have To Meddle'.

Original Crew: All in. I like them. Miniskirts, out. No whining. They make absolutely no sense, especially aboard a spaceship.

So...Whaddya think?




El_Phil
Well if your honest, those people who walked around with clipboards could go too. And all the redshirts (they just die anyway). And most of the crew who aren't in engineering or the bridge as they don't do anything, apart from fly around during explosions.




Wolfman77
Big question: Whos warp system do we use?

Personaly, I liked TNG before the speed limit incident. Voyagers warp 10 is out. Come to think of it, let's just forget that whole show existed for these puposes.

Anyone know if "Enterprise" use TOS warp numbers?




Narf
Science section - In, obviously. Say, 40 people for a well-rounded section.
Medical section - In. Size will depend on the size of the crew.
Weapons (phasers, torpedos) - In. Probably no more than three crewmen, one of whom is a member of the bridge crew. plus help from engineering - ST weapons fire is pretty automatic.
Engineering - Big ship. Say, 40 people. Some of whom will be walking around with clipboards.
Security (Red Shirts) - Need security and replacements in case of away missions to hostile territory or boarding. Say, 20-30 people. Also, they will not drop like flies. Presume some basic combat skills. - Remember, realistic.

What was TOS's warp system? And how do you calculate Stardates?

Yeah, no warp 10 is infinite. It's just really fast. TOS and TNG broke 10 lots of times.

Voyager, Enterprise, assume anything there is out unless there is a good reason. Too much contradiction in Enterprise. Can't recall anything Voyager added, aside from nerfing the borg.

Which is too bad, cause Enterprise is a good show, taken by itself.

Votes on keeping Q and the Borg? I say no to Q, he's just an annoying twerp who's only purpose is to run the TNG crew through some weird and nonsensical plot.

The Borg? What do they have to do with exploring the galaxy?




El_Phil
The Borg were essentially a Q plot device, which got extended because the audience liked them.

If you keep them, then you'd want the original "Big super tough scary half machines. Of Doom!" not the pathetic Voyager borg.




Narf
Of course.

But 'How the Federation encountered the Borg' can always be re-done. No need for Q.




SJ - I put this post second, because my post was in responce to El_Phil
If you're only going to have 200 crew or so, the ship will be very very empty.

You could probably fill the empty space with lots of reactors, weapon ports, shield generation and armor. With a gaggle of technicians to keep things running.
Maybe an industrial-sized replicator so you can snatch a passing asteroid for mass and make big replacement parts like fighters/shuttles, torpedoes or even big reactors in one piece.




Ashton
A galaxy class starship has over 1,000 crew members. So no 200 crew there.

Enterprise used TNG warp numbers. TNG warp numbers is an exponential system, with numbers from 1 to 10. Intergral warp numbers, like 2, or 9, are the most energy efficient. From 9 to 10, that is the zone of the really really fast. Warp 10, theoretically, is being completly submerged in subspace, existing everywhere at once. Let's just assume that means you can pop out anywhere, anytime.

Subspace also has some very interesting effects on biology...




Wolfman77
I don't recall TNG ever going to warp 10. I have a TNG manual at home if you want exact numbers on stuff. What about stuff from the movies.

The Voyage Home had them slingshot around the sun to reach warp 10, I think. Warp 10 on TOS was regularly exceeded in TNG, so that must be out.

Then there is the trip to the center of the galaxy in just a few weeks.... We'll just pretend that didn't happen, for the sake of our sanity (or whatever it's been replaced with)

[NullAshton]

Warp 10 is theoretical, and not an actual speed, kinda like infinity. Technically, you're completly in subspace, which is everywhere at once. So you can pop back in anywhere in normal space.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

In one TNG, they travelled to another galaxy, with the help of this mystic guy.

Wolfman77: No trips to the center of the galaxy. For the sake of what's left of our sanity.

Slingshot around the sun makes absolutly no sense as explained.

SJ: If you assume a large environmental system, 200 crew might not rattle around in there.

[Starhawk]

LOL in TOS they hit warp 45 or something like that in at least 1 episode and warp 100+ in another heh

[NullAshton]

That's because they had a linear warp system. Slingshoting aroudn the sun has something to do with timetravel, gravity wells, and FTL travel.

[Suicide Junkie]

The point here is not to chat about the crazy stuff.

Its to distill the reasonable bits.

[NullAshton]

I propose that all timetravel is out, and that the Q remain to themselves.

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

Also, No gravity plating, as it would be hideously difficult to engineer right. Most people would have magnetic boots, but you might see people walking around on the ceiling, or simply floating about. However, perhaps around the warp core, if we assume it generates a small gravity well. The warp core could be mounted inside a largish sphere, on which people could walk without need of magnetic boots.

Of course, without artificial gravity, miniskirts are out of the question too..... shame really..... but I guess you'd have mass feminist strikes across Starfleet, which kinda messes up operations.....

[Wolfman77]

200 crew for what size ship? Constitution or Galaxy?

I agree, no "expendable" crew.

[NullAshton]

The Enterprise doesn't have gravity plating. Rather, it has gravity generators, which create a downward pull from gravity. A galaxy class starship has over 1,000 crewmembers, and capability for more.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Constitution. That's only a rough figure; this isn't just my project. The final number will be whatever we think is reasonable for a functioning starship.

Also, it should still remain Star Trek. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Artificial gravity? Hmm...I don't see so much of a problem. After all, the've got pretty fast FTL. Sure, it'd be hideus for us...But them? Not so sure.

[NullAshton]

They also have structural integerty fields, running along specialized conduits in the bulkheads. Those probally direct the gravity as well.

[Wolfman77]

I agree, no big changes to the ST universe. Just drop some of the inconsistancies between the different series.

200 sounds about right for a constitution class.

I believe the manual I have states that gravity would fluctuate slightly from the center of the generator to the edges. I forget how big they are, but I think they are about half the width of the coridors. I'll try to find the book tonight and bring it to work tommorrow.

[NullAshton]

I have the technical manual for the Enterprise-D. So all your questions about that ship, I can answer. I've also seen every TNG episode ever made, all the movies, most of the Enterprise episodes, and quite a few Voyager episodes...

[Wolfman77]

I think I have the same book.

Cloak detection: Exhaust, Tachyons, or neither? I'm partial to the tachyon method myself. Anyone else, for or against?

[Starhawk]

Anyone remember the original pilot for ST? Captain Pike (with Constitution Enterprise) had a crew of 150 or something like that although granted he lost a third of his crew somehow but still anyone remember that?

Although some people say it was not in fact the Constitution class enterprise but instead just a very similar hull configuration, like the "DReadnought" which was basically just an oversized constitution with three engines.

[Wolfman77]

I remember one where they put him on trial, I think. It's been a while so I might be completly confused. I don't remember and details though.

[NullAshton]

Theoretically, it can be done for either. Tachyons are emitted by the cloaking device, which CAN be masked... The helium exhaust can just be placed in empty deutrium tanks.

[Suicide Junkie]

Wolfman77 said:
I think I have the same book.

Cloak detection: Exhaust, Tachyons, or neither? I'm partial to the tachyon method myself. Anyone else, for or against?

The thermodynamic impossibility of making it completely emissionless?

You can do pretty good, by limiting power generation and concentrating your emissions in hard-to-detect forms and directions, though.

You could also buffer the emissions temporarily... for thermal emissions, it would be like refridgerating the outer hull and pumping all the heat into a specially designed container until it melts down.

[Wolfman77]

I think, in one TNG episode they mentioned that they had mastered thermodynamics. Have they ever used thermal sensors to detect cloaked ships?

[Kamog]

"Quadrant" means something different depending on which Star Trek series. In TOS, there were many many quadrants in the galaxy, but in STNG there are only four: Alpha, Beta, Delta, Gamma.

The linear warp speed scale of TOS made more sense than the warp-10 maximum scale later on. With the 10-maximum scale, it's hard to say how fast one warp factor is compared to another. For example, how much faster is warp 9.9 compared to warp 9.8? Is it just 1% faster, or is more like 10 times faster? How do you calculate the actual speed?

[Atrocities]

Starhawk said:
Anyone remember the original pilot for ST? Captain Pike (with Constitution Enterprise) had a crew of 150 or something like that although granted he lost a third of his crew somehow but still anyone remember that?

Although some people say it was not in fact the Constitution class enterprise but instead just a very similar hull configuration, like the "DReadnought" which was basically just an oversized constitution with three engines.



I have it on DVD. (Of course he would) They were attacked by some race on some planet and suffored a lot of casualities.

I saw the original B&W version when I was a kid. I thought to myself... they made this in the 60's, what visionaries.

They lost that visionary aspect of the show when they turned to treknobable.

[El_Phil]

I'd go for exhausts myself, there seems no reason for Tachyons other than they're a sci-fi standard. Everyone uses them when they need a clever particle.

Exhausts at least give you clever options and more to work with story wise, whereas if you start being consistent with tachyons cloaks are either easy to penetrate or very very hard to.

[Wolfman77]

Warp 9.9 is quite a bit faster than 9.8. I have never been able to find an exact formula, but I haven't tried since 8th grade or so. Here's the approximate breakdown of the interger warp speeds:
Warp 1 - 1 times the speed of light
2 - 10
3 - 39
4 - 102
5 - 214
6 - 392
7 - 656
8 - 1024
9 - 1516
They used an Excel spreadsheet to calculate them.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Suggestion: I make an ongoing list of stuff, then make polls every now and then.

Current list: Linear or exponential warp. Tachyons or exhaust to penatrate cloak or tachyons and exhaust. Many quadrants or four quadrants. Artificial gravity or no artificial gravity. Time travel or no time travel. Q or no Q. Borg or no Borg.

Comments?

[Wolfman77]

Sounds like a plan. Maybe throw in neither for the cloak qustion.

Don't know why I didn't think of google earlier, but here is a link to a warp factor calculator.

http://home.att.net/~srschmitt/script_warpcalc.html

Seems fairly acurate for TNG, I don't know TOS warp factors.
9.8 = 4472 times the speed of light
9.9 = 6555
approximately

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

narf poit chez BOOM said:
Current list: Linear or exponential warp. Tachyons or exhaust to penatrate cloak or tachyons and exhaust. Many quadrants or four quadrants. Artificial gravity or no artificial gravity. Time travel or no time travel. Q or no Q. Borg or no Borg.



Warp should be exponential. Otherwise, at the really high speeds, you get odd situations with slightly fluctuating warp speeds (say, between 276 and 280 or so), it seems kinda awkward when synchronizing speeds (and especially acceleration), moreover, it just sounds wierd.

Tachyons are supposed to be FTL particles according to ST lore. Me, I believe in "tachyons" in RL, but I think they have little place in sci-fi, even if it would be just because of the fact that IT IS SIMPLY IMPOSSIBLE TO CAPTURE AND UTILIZE A TACHYON. Exhaust, temperature, seems right but what makes more sense to me; gravitic distortions. Each object emits gravity, and in the near-vacuum of space, the gravity emitted by a cloaked ship would be almost laughably easy to find. However, you might get interference from such things as dark matter clumps, but that aside..... I say go with gravitic sensors to detect cloaked ships.

Look at the word; "quadrant". Look at the first four letters; "quad". Exactly. Sure, you'll have smaller dividers (like Sections, Regions, Sectors, Vicinities (i.e. Badlands vicinity), Systems, Orbits), but "quadrant" implies "one of four sections".

Maybe TNG featured a gravity generator (like that abomination Enterprise does), DS9 features gravity plating. Trust me, I have the DS9 Technical Manual so I guess that counts as canon. Gravity plating consists of a large net of gravity generators..... each about the length of a US football. I say either a gravity (well) generator, or zero-G, mag-boots and a warp core which emits a gravity well allowing people to walk on it.

No time travel. Reasons? Well, for one it is physically impossible and plainly stupid. Time travel is generally stupid, except in H.G. Wells' The Time Machine, and perhaps some other sources I don't know about.

Q = God. ST = science. Q =/= ST.

Borg..... well, possibly. Only then A.) they use nanoprobes for a heck of a lot more tasks than just assimilation, or B.) their ships are (partially) organic. No Borg Queen, no Locutus. Both are plainly stupid.

*****

Also, for purposes of avoiding fits of rage, Enterprise (shudder) is considered to be absolutely non-canon. I mean, they made First Contact with the Ferengi, the Romulans and the Xindi. The Romulans were only first encountered in TOS, the Ferengi in TNG and the Xindi weren't encountered at all in later series. Enterprise = biggest [censored section is five pages long] to ever have been broadcast under the Star Trek moniker. And don't give me that "Enterprise isn't ST 'cause there's no ST in the title" sh***, Enterprise has warp drives, Zephram Cochrane, and the Vulcans. Hence, Enterprise is ST. Enterprise is NOT canon. [/rant]

[Wolfman77]

The TNG manual has gravity generators in it. Enterprise-D uses 1200 total, 800 in the saucer, split into two sections and 400 in the Battle/Engineering section also split into two sections. They are also tied to the Inertial Dampeners. They are only 25cm high and 50cm in diameter, and apperently effective to 30 meters.

Sounds like these, or a smaller version, make up the gravity plating for DS9. I don't think it matters too much which way we go.

Do we want to change things in the ST universe, or just get rid of the things that contradict each other?

I second the motion for no time travel. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Captain Kwok]

Exciting stuff.

But instead of revising Star Trek, why don't you just create your own sci-fi universe based on your discussions here and populate it with your own 'plausible' technologies, races, etc?

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Well, I want a rational ST that I can like without having to ignore these jarring plot holes.

[Wolfman77]

We could do both, but if we want our own universe we should probably do it in a new thread. Keep this for Narf's original idea of a revised ST.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Poll thread created. http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/threads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=382781

Hey, I'd be interested in that, too.

I'm not running it, though. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Warp: Exponential; 10-2. (Whine whine oh well)
Cloak detection: Tachyons 4; Exhaust 4; Tachyons and Exhaust 4; None 0. Propose further discussion - If nobody wants to discuss further, Tachyons and Exhaust.
Quadrants: Four; 10-2
Artificial Gravity: Yes; 12-0 (Only clear-cut vote)
Time Travel: No; 11-1
The Q: No; 9-3 (Woot!)
The Borg: Yes; 11-1

[Suicide Junkie]

For the two people who voted for linear warp speeds, please explain why you think talking about "warp 216" instead of a nice easy "warp 6" is a good idea.

[El_Phil]

Going for both makes things flexible, you can have cloaked ships with good anti-tachyon work but bad exhausts, or vice versa. Or, on ships that are suitably rare and expensive, good at beating both.

Come to think of it, how about Romulan cloaks you beat with tachyons, Klingons with exhausts? TNG had the throwing tachyons at Romulan cloaks, and ST:VI sought the Klingon exhausts so it's even consistent! (excluding the hundreds of contradictory examples I've almost certainly forgotten)

[Suicide Junkie]

My main issue with the tachyons, is;
What makes them any different from the rest of the "particles-of-the-week"?

IMO, the critical thing about cloaks is that:
- They make it very hard, but not quite impossible, to detect the ship.
Using tachyons to detect the ship smacks of recycled PotW.

[Ed Kolis]

Suicide Junkie said:
For the two people who voted for linear warp speeds, please explain why you think talking about "warp 216" instead of a nice easy "warp 6" is a good idea.



Because you wouldn't talk in terms of weird powers and stuff to begin with - you'd just say "helm, bring us to warp 200" (or even better, "helm, bring us to 200c" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif) - do you ever see speed limits posted as 49 miles per hour just because 49 is square and so it's "gear 7" or something? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif No, you round your speeds off to a nice decimal value!

[Suicide Junkie]

Ah. Sounds good. I hereby change my vote!

[Atrocities]

Warp is just a stupid way to say "GO REALY FAST AND GET US THE HELL OUT OF HERE MR. SULU!"

[El_Phil]

Suicide Junkie said:
My main issue with the tachyons, is;
What makes them any different from the rest of the "particles-of-the-week"?




They do have a large variety of funky properties, mainly gaining speed when they lose energy. The other man trick is their slowest possible speed, which is the speed of light. Of course this is entirely irreleveant to this issue as no ST writer ever thinks that deeply about it.

What makes them different is that they are a sci-fi standby since they year dot. There must be a law, or strict guideline, that requies the use of tachyons in anything calling itself sci-fi, its the only explanation.

[Suicide Junkie]

Everything you posted there makes it seem more technobabbly.

In the same manner that "gamma rays" make "the hulk", "tachyons" make the "cloak detector".
Pure fertilizer-grade technobabble.

[Atrocities]

What is your favorite Trecknobabble comment of all time?

Mine was in Generation when Scotty was coming with the the idea on how to get the Enterprise B out of the Nexus. I do miss him, and McCoy too. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

[Wolfman77]

Yeah tachyons are all technobabble, but how does exhaust make sense? What exhaust does a matter-antimatter reaction produce? The only thing I can find is that they produce gamma-rays (funny how that ties in, huh SJ?). We can detect gamma-rays wit hour current level of technology, It's only fair to assume they can as well. Therefore cloaking devices must block any gamma-rays that the warp core shielding doesn't, or they would be spoted quite easily.

Since we are keeping the artificial gravity, masking that signature should be doable.

I suppose we could say a few gamma rays leak through, compareable to background radiation, but if their sensors are configure to look for only to wavelength produced by certain engines, they could at least narrow it down. Especially it the source is moving. Still a bit of technobabble, but no tachyons.

[NullAshton]

Matter-antimatter engines are only used for warp drive, and are simply not used for impulse engines. Impulse engines use fusion generators, which also serve as secondary power in battle. Helium exhaust! Q is plot device, and doesn't mess with stuff that much, so I say leave him in there. And timetravel is just plain funny, and serves as a good excuse to revisit yesterday's enterprise. Besides, I like that episode where the Enterprise-D is stuck in a timeloop.

[NullAshton]

And tachyons are emitted by the cloaking generator as a by-product of cloaking the ship.

[Suicide Junkie]

The goal of a reactor would be to absorb all of the gamma rays for use by ship's systems. None need be emitted by the ship.

The thermodynamic argument is simple. If the cloaking device prevents the ship from emitting energy (in order to be undetectable), then the ship can't be losing energy.
Since the ship is generating energy to power lifesupport, the cloak, and anything else they're using, the energy in the ship is monotonically increasing.
At some point, the temperature of the ship will exceed the melting point of its hull, and its bye-bye cloaked ship.

Thusly, the ship must be emitting at least as much energy as it is generating, averaged over time. Even when cloaked.
This can be in the form of neutrinos, large numbers of low energy photons, small numbers of high energy photons, hot particles, whatever.
It is highly unlikely that you would see gamma rays. That would mean that their reactor is not powering the ship, and is unshielded (in the lead-wall sense).

[Wolfman77]

Null: I thought they needed the matter-antimatter engines to run the cloak. Even so why not store the helium while you are cloaked? Of course it seems rather odd as the cloak is supposed to absorb energy, why does it need energy to run?

SJ: yes, the reactor would absorb gamma rays to create power, I just didn't think it needed to absorb every single one. Thought they might have a few leak out though, since some of those high energy ones can pass right through the Earth and all, but I suppose those would be hard for sensors to detect. My original thought was that the reactors could absorb them up to a certain wavelength (or down to as more acurately discribes higher energy EM waves). After this the shielding (lead wall sense) would absorb the rest, but not perfectly.

Then again if the cloak is absorbing energy, or even just deflecting it back to the ship, couldn't that be used as a temporary power source while cloaked? Assuming that some, barely detectable, energy is lost, then its just a matter of sensitve enough sensors to pick it up. Or waiting untill they need to start their engines for loss of power after a few hours or something. I suppose this could be called the exhaust.

[NullAshton]

Romulan cloaks don't work by masking emissions, they work by phasing a ship a bit out of tune with reality. In theory, a perfect cloak would be indetectable, and the cloaked ship would be able to move through other objects. The energy is expended in remaining out-of-phase. My guess is that the expended energy is re-emitted as tachyons, like heat is emitted during most reactions.

ST reactors do not 'absourb' gamma rays, rather, they use the dilithium crystal to channel the energy into a purer form, called 'plasma', which is redirected through the plasma conduits to power the main systems, and isn't very regulated. Fusion power is used for the items that require less power, such as lights, or those touch panels.

Exhaust could be contained... but for regular space-travel it's probally so small as to not give away the ship. They just didn't think that exhaust would give away a cloaked ship, since sensors probally weren't programmed to detect it...

[Suicide Junkie]

My point is that the power source dosen't matter.
They need to have some energy generation in order to stay alive and operating.
If they were to have no emmissions, then the temperature of the ship would have to rise. On a temporary basis that can be handled, but these ships run on gigawatts. Lifesupport, artificial gravity, structural integrity, containment fields, doors & lifts, and all the bells and whistles. It won't take long before they have to release the waste heat or melt into a bubble of expensive goo.

[NullAshton]

Okay, so the more energy it uses, the faster the tachyons emitted are? Or slower, actually.

[Suicide Junkie]

In the same manner that "gamma rays" make "the hulk", "tachyons" make the "cloak detector".
Pure fertilizer-grade technobabble.

[NullAshton]

So? Tachyons are cool, they stay. Tachyons are one of the cooler things of star trek, remove them and it falls apart.

[Suicide Junkie]

" Narf:
Hey, anyone want to create a rational and consistant ST universe?"

Your opinion of coolness has nothing to do with rationality or consistency.

---

Now, I have no objections to having cloaked ships emit tachyons, provided that they are in fact tachyons, and the side effects are taken care of.

For example, if ships can emit and detect tachyons, why aren't they used for FTL communications? Less energy to make the message go faster seems to be a huge advantage.

[Wolfman77]

So tachyon could be used for detecting Romulan ships. Sounds ok to me since their clock shifts them slightly out of phase. I remember a couple TNG shows about that. One with Geordi and Roe, and one about Rikers former ship.

How about the Klingon ships, do they work differently? Maybe some kind of exhaust detection would work good for them. Though I'm still not sold on them just thinking exhaust conainment was unimportant.

SJ: I was thinking that if they could store, or block the energy then they should also be able to use some of it for power. Kind of like recycling, to extent the time they could remain cloaked. Not that it means a whole lot as it is sci-fi, but at least then the energy used wouldn't melt them in a calculation (x gigawatts heats up y Kg to Zº in t minutes). The longer they stay cloaked the more they emit, untill it is finally detectable.

[NullAshton]

Because tachyons are hard to form a coherent message with? Or to modulate, for that matter. Klingon ships stole their cloaks from the romulans. And I think SJ is talking about heat buildup.

[Wolfman77]

I assumed it was heat build up, still could be used in this way though, couldn't it?

Someone should talk to Narf about using "rational" "consistant" and "Star Trek" in the same sentance. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[Suicide Junkie]

Using the energy they generate efficiently is always a good goal.
And the less they generate from fuel stores, the less they have to store in their hull.

However, entropy prevents you from recycling energy.

---

You can easily have different detection methods for romulans or klingons.
The design decision of how to get rid of the heat generated on your ship would turn out differently for both. Internal politics, probably at the forefront.
"Design X was chosen because the company which designed it was located it the home province of the current governor", for example.

[Wolfman77]

They use a warp core to travel FTL, powered by matter-antimatter reaction using dilithium to regulate it. They have artificial gravity, and energy shields. Makes entropy less of a "this won't work" problem, in relation to the rest of it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smirk.gif I do know what you mean though.

[Suicide Junkie]

If they were able to reverse entropy on a closed system like a cloaked ship, they'd have no need for fuel at all...

Also, I don't see any evidence that the "warp core" does anything out of the ordinary...
It just generates gobs of energy via simple matter/antimatter annihilation (with a technobabble reaction mediator).

As far as I can tell, the nacelles do all the FTL work.
The "fact" that the impulse drive and even the computer core use the same type of TB field when running off of simple fusion or emergency battery power is also telling.

[Atrocities]

Stop Picking On Star Trek! Ours is not to question why, it is simply to stare blankly and watch and to think not!

[NullAshton]

What is a TB field? That last sentence that Suicide Junkie said, I did not understand that. What do you mean telling?

The nacelles are powered by the energy from the matter/antimatter reaction system, using the high-energy plasma flow to create the warp field.

And yes, they have to worry about enthropy. Only about a third of power that goes into the warp nacelles actually moves the ship.

[Suicide Junkie]

TB = Technobabble.

And one of the nifty side effects is that you don't absolutely need an antimatter reactor. It is by far the most compact and powerful energy source, of course, but not absolutely critical for limping home.

[NullAshton]

Impulse drive uses the fusion engine like a regular fusion drive... This would be the exhaust, probally. Hmmm. Computer core operates faster than light, using some form of warp field I think.

[Suicide Junkie]

The impulse drive supposedly generates fractional warp fields in order to allow the ship to zoom around without time dilation effects and huge thrust plumes during those 1000g accelerations to significant fractions of c.

[NullAshton]

That's highly energy-inefficient. Why would they have those openings on the rear of the saucer section and battle section, then? They don't use warp fields near planets, because it's not always accurate. A little mistake, and bam, you run smack into a planet.

[Suicide Junkie]

Why don't you go look it up in your tech manual then? Its not like they're going fast enough that they'll not see a planet coming.

[NullAshton]

6.1, Impulse Drive

Two main impulse engines on the back of the saucer section, one strip on the battle section labled Main impulse engine.

10 km/second² acceleration for the impulse engines, which is reached by a small driver coil to do a small distortion of the space around the enterprise, allowing speedy acceleration. Interesting. Normal impulse operations are limited to 0.25c, for time dilation reasons. Impulse drive is much more efficient that warp drive, however, at 85% efficency at 0.5c.

[Suicide Junkie]

While efficiency of scale makes sense for the bigger drive, trying to run it too far below or above its designed "sweet spot" will naturally drop efficiency into the crapper.

[NullAshton]

Like warp drive, which is why it's more efficient to stick to intergral warp factors...

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Of course, we can completly redesign that.

[Wolfman77]

OK, I can see noone liked my ideas on cloaking devices, so I'll say no more about that part of it for now. How about we just enjoy the TB for what it is concerning them, and use exhaust and tachyons, depending on the situation, and not disect it too much.

The engines seem to make sense when described in terms of efficiency, but if they use a low intensity warp field for impulse, why do they have to worry about time dialation. I thought warp fields were supposed to fix that problem. Do they need a field strenght high enough to reach warp 1 before it effects time, or am I missing someting else?

[NullAshton]

Warp fields fix the problem because they're not traveling faster than light, as far as physics are concerned. The low intensity warp field for impulse is to make the enterprise seem lighter, and thus have more acceleration.

[Wolfman77]

Ah, I get it now. Thanks for to explanation.

[NullAshton]

Of course, unless you're dealing with omega particles, it doesn't really matter.

[Wolfman77]

How's that?

[NullAshton]

Because when an omega particle explodes, it creates a field that you cannot use warp drive in.

[Wolfman77]

oh, yeah, now I remember that. From a voyager show, isn't it? Something about and uncontrolable reaction that destroys subspace, I think.

[NullAshton]

I think it interferes with subspace somehow. Not destroy it, since if you destroy subspace, then you'd be left with no normal space...

[Wolfman77]

Oh, OK. It's been years since I saw the show.

Speaking of this topic. Are we keeping Omega particles in Narf's ST. I think we talked about leaving the whole Voyager series out, but I don't think that was in the poll. I don't have any problems with keeping them, but a few things would probably need to come out. Anyone else?

[NullAshton]

I think Voyager needs to run away from most fights with the borg, instead of kicking their butt every time.

[El_Phil]

The problem with running away from "Teh Borg" is that they can run harder and faster than you can. And they wont stop. Ever.

Something I did forget, tachyons have their own inherent causality problems. As in very serious, casual loop type problems, if they exist in classical sci-fi terms. Of course they don't, being products of special relativity theory they are far more complex.

For this reason I'm changing my mind and going exhaust route, which bypasses any possibilty of temporal rubbish.

What am I saying? Warp drive has awful problems of it's own so it doesn't matter does it?

[NullAshton]

HEY! No erasing tachyons just because they have time travel! Temporal 'rubbish' makes for an interesting plot line, when used correctly!

[El_Phil]

When has it been used correctly? Very rarely is the answer and when it's bad it's awful.

Besides this is about a consistent Trek. Time travel cannot be consistent in any causal universe.

Tachyons can only got so quick and conform with relativity if they have negative mass. This makes interaction with them (like detecting them) somewhat tricky. What you end up doing is trying to detect the result of collisions and other such things. Hence the lack of evidence (bar one debated incidence).

[NullAshton]

So, have tachyons have negative mass? Don't have any problems with it.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Hmm...Could the energy shields in ST be artificial (Quantum) mass?

[Suicide Junkie]

Energy shields are pretty hard to rationalize.
But at the very least we can try to make them consistent.

Are they leaky or solid?
Limited charge, or work until the generator is damaged?
What is allowed to penetrate?

[NullAshton]

The shields in star trek use gravitons, projecting a force on incoming weapons. Beam weapons are refracted and disappated. Technically, they are leaky, as the more they are damaged the more leaks through. But armor dissapates the damage that goes through quite nicely. They work as long as energy can be fed to the shields, and can be redirected from other systems, such as weapons or life support. Subspace weapons penetrate them, however subspace weapons have unpredictable effects on life.

[Suicide Junkie]

Various episodes sure do like to throw in the solid-but-limited-charge thing though.

[NullAshton]

Bah. Leaky shielding when it gets into the 10% region.

[Suicide Junkie]

Of course, there are also many episodes that use the perma-leaky shielding.

Shields are almost certainly based on a plotiton field. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Wolfman77]

What about the large battles in DS9? I don't remember seeing shields on anyones ships during them. I could understand if Dominion ships could penetrate Fed shields, but it didn't seem like there were any on dominion ships.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

That's because they didn't have the budget for a real space battle.

Besides, we're not exactly going canon here...

[NullAshton]

Canon is good. We just take the majority of the canon, and take out the tiny parts that conflict with the majority.