Star Trek Maps (1980)

[Unicron]

Novak, we're still getting the hang of the new forum software and we don't have the same multiquote option as we did on the old server. But if possible, can you please consolidate your replies into a single post instead of multiple ones? If you click reply on a post it'll quote automatically. Thanks.

Normally I'm not fond of a thread this old getting bumped, but since there's worthwhile content being added I'll keep it open.

 

[Christopher]

The biggest problem in importing TOS speeds into the TNG era isn't TNG (which often flew vast distances, especially in its early seasons) or DS9 (which at times seemed absurdly close to Earth, from the travel times) but that dratted USS Voyager and it's supposed top cruising speed of Warp 9.975, along with the stated return trip of 70,000 ly in 75 years. However, what if the problem is the starship herself?

Except that the assumption that a starship could manage roughly a thousand light years per year did not originate with Voyager, but rather with TNG's "The Price," in which the Barzan wormhole covered 70,000 light years and it was said that it would take "eighty years or so" to reach the other end by warp drive. It's also consistent with DS9: "Battle Lines," where Sisko said it would take "our fastest starship" over 67 years to cover the 70,000 light years from Bajor to the far end of the wormhole. (The writers were oddly obsessed with the 70,000-ly figure.) Although there are a couple of dissenting views; TNG: "Where No One Has Gone Before" posits over 300 years to cover 2.7 million light years, which is nearly 9,000 ly/year. And "Q Who" has them travel 7000 ly and says it'd take 2 years, 7 months to reach the nearest starbase -- although the nearest starbase could be thousands of ly from where they started, so we can't really assess that one.

 

[Novak Senkovic]

With regard to Gothos and the distance traveled:
On top of what Christopher mentions about the Federation borders vs. the edge of explored space, I think we must also consider two other things:

• Space is three-dimensional: The Milky Way's thin stellar disk is about 2000 light-years thick on average. I don't know exactly how thick it is near the Sun, or how close we are to the top/bottom of the disk, but if the distance to either the top or bottom is close to 900 light-years or more, you can have Gothos 900 light-years away and still have it fall a cyliner with a tiny radius.
  
• The Federation may not grow symmetrically: Space is big, and the further out you get, and at distances less than about 1000 light-years, its volume grows as the cube of the distance from your starting point.
  So, with a constant rate of exploration, if it takes 100 years to explore all the space within 100 light-years form Earth, it will take you about 700 additional years (800 years total) to explore everything with 200 light-years form Earth.
  Even if the rate of exploration has doubled in that time, it will take about 350 additional years.
  However, I suspect that the exploration is not symmetric at all; Starfleet probably selects a direction and tries to survey everything within a certain distance from that direction until they've gotten far enough to warrant a new starbase or shipyard.
  So, even if Gothos was near the edge of Federation space at the time, that doesn't mean the Federation border is anything like a sphere 900 light years in radius. Indeed, Star Charts suggests that it is quite oblong.

Spot on explanation!

Interestingly, however, Memory Alpha claims Marc Okrand was the one who first suggested the name Kronos. If true, it's possible that the Qo'noS spelling came first, or that they emerged in parallel; presumably, he's the only one who knows.

Gene Roddenberry died in 1991. Richard Arnold was fired from his Star Trek duties the very next day. So it's been nearly a quarter of a century since either of their opinions were relevant, and many of Roddenberry's successors have made TAS references in canonical productions. Please read the thread I linked to.

 

[Novak Senkovic]

as far as I am concerned, if star trek's creator didn't consider TAS canonical than neither do I​

 

[Christopher]

as far as I am concerned, if star trek's creator didn't consider TAS canonical than neither do I​

Then you'd better consider the fifth and sixth movies and large swaths of TOS non-canonical as well. By the end, he pretty much considered all Trek he didn't personally produce to be less than canonical. So that would limit it to the pilots and first two seasons of TOS, TMP, and most of the first season of TNG, and nothing else.

It's kind of incongruous to use Roddenberry as the standard for something like this, because he would've been the last to see his own series's continuity as something fixed and definitive. He saw it all along as something mutable, treating it as an imperfect dramatization of the "actual" adventures of the Enterprise. There were things in TOS that he wasn't satisfied with because of the budgetary and conceptual and logistical compromises he had to make, and when he had the chance to change them into something better, like redesigning the Klingon makeup for TMP, he just changed them and told fans that this was the reality and TOS just hadn't portrayed it right. He was constantly redefining the canon. He even approached TNG as a soft reboot, preferring to distance it from TOS concepts and continuity and having the connection be more a matter of lip service. If he'd lived another ten or fifteen years, he might have changed his mind about TAS. If he'd stayed healthy enough to keep showrunning TNG, he probably would've contradicted more and more of TOS over time -- just as TOS often contradicted itself as it invented and evolved the continuity along the way.

But Roddenberry was never the exclusive auteur behind Star Trek except in his own self-promotion. It strengths have always come from being an ensemble creation. Roddenberry was the one who had the basic idea and steered the ship, but not all his decisions were the right ones, and having other creators to balance him and offer different perspectives made the show better.

 

[Novak Senkovic]

Funny you should post this now, we were just discussing something very similar over on this thread!
http://www.trekbbs.com/threads/star...isruption-technology-alteration.277476/page-5

The biggest problem in importing TOS speeds into the TNG era isn't TNG (which often flew vast distances, especially in its early seasons) or DS9 (which at times seemed absurdly close to Earth, from the travel times) but that dratted USS Voyager and it's supposed top cruising speed of Warp 9.975, along with the stated return trip of 70,000 ly in 75 years. However, what if the problem is the starship herself?

Hailed from the start as a new and high-tech starship, Voyager probably sported more types of experimental technology than just the bio-neural gel packs (and which almost crippled the ship when they caught space-flu). Specifically, I'm thinking of those teeny-tiny nacelles, almost half the proportional size of the ones on the Enterprise-D. Never designed as a long range explorer, the Intrepid class may have been the testbed for a new type of nacelle - smaller but more technologically advanced, able to fully utilise the power output of a super sized "tower" warp core thanks to special <tech> components. Unfortunately, when these were burned out by the Caretaker's displacement wave (both had incompatible energy emissions) the diminutive nacelles were reduced to a fraction of their former propulsive power. Like the gel packs the <tech> components could not be repaired when damaged, and spares were only available from properly equipped Starfleet bases - not normally an issue in Voyager's assigned patrol area, but a massive problem when on the other side of the galaxy! The 9.975 Warp Core remained intact, but the warp coils themselves could only handle such power outputs for limited periods of time and even then at much reduced efficiency compared to their more traditional equivalents (see quoted sprinting speeds in Manoeuvres and The 37s).
Incidentally, we can see that the "small but advanced" type of nacelle never really caught on - the more robust and traditional type (big = fast) is still in effect on board the Enterprise-E

A final point - Voyager herself only averaged about 400ly a year for most of the series - the rest of her progress was made using helping hands and shortcuts. This really wasn't a speedy ship!

 

[Novak Senkovic]

It has been stated as you said in Voyager that it would take Voyager 75 years to cross 70000LY. The warp speed is not stated however we can work it out to aproximately 1000c. THis doesn't mean that warp 9.975 is ideally this fast, it just means that's the maximum speed they can maintain for the entire length of the journey.

 

[Novak Senkovic]

The question of what's canon and what isn't in Star Trek is dubious at best. For purposes of stardate calualtiobs I consider everything that was officially sanctioned by Paramount on screen only to be canon except TAS. I do not conisder fan fiction, films, episodes or RPG's to be canon. However, certain elements in them which have been used I would consider canon such as Vulcan's Forge taken from TAS, and Nyota and Hikaru's name taken from one the novels. If I was to include everything ever written or made Stardates would be impossible to calculate and very impracticle. Incidentally the on screen displays are not to be taken as written in stone either, especially as alot of them are in jokes. I do include Miss Piggy in TMP as canon, V'Ger was from launched from Earth at that point in time when the muppets was popular.

 

[Novak Senkovic]

Novak, we're still getting the hang of the new forum software and we don't have the same multiquote option as we did on the old server. But if possible, can you please consolidate your replies into a single post instead of multiple ones? If you click reply on a post it'll quote automatically. Thanks.

Normally I'm not fond of a thread this old getting bumped, but since there's worthwhile content being added I'll keep it open.

Sorry just read this it's difficult to do that as I often think of things to say after my posts but I will try

 

[Christopher]

The question of what's canon and what isn't in Star Trek is dubious at best.

It isn't really; fans just have a lot of mistaken notions about canon that complicate the issue needlessly. But that's already been discussed in depth in the thread I linked to earlier.

 

[Mytran]

Except that the assumption that a starship could manage roughly a thousand light years per year did not originate with Voyager, but rather with TNG's "The Price," in which the Barzan wormhole covered 70,000 light years and it was said that it would take "eighty years or so" to reach the other end by warp drive. It's also consistent with DS9: "Battle Lines," where Sisko said it would take "our fastest starship" over 67 years to cover the 70,000 light years from Bajor to the far end of the wormhole. (The writers were oddly obsessed with the 70,000-ly figure.) Although there are a couple of dissenting views; TNG: "Where No One Has Gone Before" posits over 300 years to cover 2.7 million light years, which is nearly 9,000 ly/year. And "Q Who" has them travel 7000 ly and says it'd take 2 years, 7 months to reach the nearest starbase -- although the nearest starbase could be thousands of ly from where they started, so we can't really assess that one.

Ah thanks, I knew there'd be further evidence against this notion, but it's still fairly fresh in my mind and I haven't had the chance to look up all the variables yet!

It is indeed fascinating how often that 70,000 figure comes up. However, Maybe Starfleet warp engines just aren't designed with continuous high speed operation in mind? Certainly, by the time of the 24th century they are accustomed to operating within a network of starbases and supply lines that can carry out the necessary refuelling and Warp Coil overhauls every 5,000 light years. It may be that Sisko's "fastest starship" is simply their fastest long-distance starship, not their fastest (sprinter) ship overall.

In terms of opposing information, there's also Manoeuvres where Voyager passes a stationary Kazon vessel at two billion KMS (6,671c) and The 37s, where Tom Paris states (or boasts) that Warp 9.9 is four billion miles a second (21,473c)

as far as I am concerned, if star trek's creator didn't consider TAS canonical than neither do I

Then you'd better consider the fifth and sixth movies and large swaths of TOS non-canonical as well. By the end, he pretty much considered all Trek he didn't personally produce to be less than canonical. So that would limit it to the pilots and first two seasons of TOS, TMP, and most of the first season of TNG, and nothing else.

Or to paraphrase Mr Spock - "Roddenberry is the beginning of canon, not the end".

It's interesting to note that Gene's intention to use TMP as a soft reboot and treat TOS as a dramatised version of Captain Kirk's logs (with all the inaccuracies that such a project would entail, such as smooth headed Klingons) would have worked too - if it hadn't been from those dratted kids from DS9! Scotty's brief look at an old Consitution Class bridge was incongruous enough, but after Sisko & pals' little jaunt through the Orb Of Time, there really was no going back as far as canon was concerned - leading to Enterprise's effort to "explain" the Klingon problem and further expose the truth that TOS really had happened just as we saw in the episodes themselves (or broad strokes of it, at least).

 

[Christopher]

It's interesting to note that Gene's intention to use TMP as a soft reboot and treat TOS as a dramatised version of Captain Kirk's logs (with all the inaccuracies that such a project would entail, such as smooth headed Klingons) would have worked too - if it hadn't been from those dratted kids from DS9! Scotty's brief look at an old Consitution Class bridge was incongruous enough, but after Sisko & pals' little jaunt through the Orb Of Time, there really was no going back as far as canon was concerned - leading to Enterprise's effort to "explain" the Klingon problem and further expose the truth that TOS really had happened just as we saw in the episodes themselves (or broad strokes of it, at least).

Which just goes to show how ongoing stories evolve and change direction over time, which is just why it's unwise to expect absolutely perfect consistency or a completely unambiguous standard of what parts are "real."

 

[Mytran]

Yeah but it's fun to try

 

[Novak Senkovic]

Which just goes to show how ongoing stories evolve and change direction over time, which is just why it's unwise to expect absolutely perfect consistency or a completely unambiguous standard of what parts are "real."

Christopher what are you a writer of

 

[Mytran]

Just google "Christopher L Bennett" and you'll get a good spread of results! His website used to on his signature tag, but I can't see it there now.

https://christopherlbennett.wordpress.com/

 

[Novak Senkovic]

Just google "Christopher L Bennett" and you'll get a good spread of results! His website used to on his signature tag, but I can't see it there now.

https://christopherlbennett.wordpress.com/

ok thanks

 

[Christopher]

Just google "Christopher L Bennett" and you'll get a good spread of results! His website used to on his signature tag, but I can't see it there now.

https://christopherlbennett.wordpress.com/

My old website ceased to exist when its hosting service decided to stop hosting websites (and never bothered to tell me beforehand). So I reconstructed the site on my blog, which is called Written Worlds and is still linked in my signature.

 

[Mytran]

I can't see see your signature at all right now. But maybe that is a consequence of viewing on my phone. This new forum has many changes like that!

 

[BK613]

It's interesting that variable warp velocities are being discussed in this thread; the booklet that came with the map posited a value χ (chi) that accounted for that.

 

[Mytran]

Yeah, the chi factor is great for making the "official" cubed Warp Factor more akin to what TOS depicted in terms of extremely high speeds. It's not so good when applied to TNG era speeds, since they seemed to stick far more rigidly to the velocity's given on that series' warp scale.