it is obvious that you seem a little bit centred towards your self. Did I mentioned your name? No, I was speaking about certain behaviour, not only about a single person. If you think that means you, well there is a old word of the humans, I have heard from some of the Star Fleet defectors onboard "if the shoes fit, than wear it". Seems as IF the shoes fit...
What is obvious is that you were engaging in a thinly-veiled reference to me by your misapprehension of my position when you wrote:
"Or would such a infiltrator playing a 100 percent Republican, with a deep hate towards all what is TS, and towards the Imperial Past and all what was great and source of proud for so many Romulans, in that way showing that he could be trusted by the Republican leadership, minimizing any risk of a reunification, alienating many Romulans both inside and outside of the Republic? And by this way making it clear to the last Uhlan in the TS, that there could be never any reconciliation, that they must fight to their last breath or being executed by the Republicans."
The reason this is obvious is because these are precisely the flawed descriptions you have made several times of what I have advocated. The absence of my name does not suffice to excuse you when the words you used were the same words you have used in trying but failing to express what I have actually said.
And yeas I have no idea how proud you are of the Romulan past. Obviously not at all. Yelling more than once "EMPIRES ARE BAD!" and "THE STAR EMPIRE WAS ROTTEN" shows no pride at all, no respect for generations of Romulans who call the great Star Empire there home and who sacrificed a lot for that - including members of nearly all families in the Republic. It only shows a political thinking which could maybe come from the Feds or Vulcans, but very few Romulans share this radical point of view. The Star Empire was the past of the Romulans, and a proud past for many. It is the present for many of then, those who life under the rule of the Imperial Remnants. And it might be the future of the Romulan people, too. There is no reason to rule that out.
I'm pretty sure I didn't say "Empires are bad," much less did I yell it. I may have teased at some point with a phrase like "Empire are bad, mkay?" (which is a sort of meme found often in Anglo satire, and which should not be taken at face value as any sort of serious absolute declaration). I am no fan of imperialism, that much is true, but that is not identical with an absolute "All S are P" statement such as you have alleged I made. I also never said that The Star Empire was rotten throughout its history. I have, on the contrary, said that it began to rot and that eventually the rotting and festering destroyed it from the inside. I have also stated repeatedly that the Star Empire as it was in TOS was considerably different from its later manifestations and that there was a time when it was possessed of honor.
And the Star Empire as it remains today does not have the resources or the numbers to ever rise again to dominance over the Romulan and Reman people, nor does it have sufficient appeal to those people that they would allow its crimes against them to be swept under the rug and vote to restore it.
I have, however, stated more than once in this forum that in time, the Republic will stop being a Republic and the Romulans and Remans will have a new empire, and that it might even be named "Shiar ih'Saeihr Rihan" again, but that it will not be the same entity as the late Shiar ih'Saeihr Rihan which is now but a rotting corpse being consumed by detritivores and carrion-eaters like the remnants of the High Command of the Tal'Shiar. And it's likely that eventually, that Empire will also begin to rot from the inside, because that tendency is a salient feature of empires. The reason I have predicted these things is because of the evidence of the histories of every species supporting the idea that socio-political entities experience a cyclical (or perhaps spiral) life, and that these changes appear to be inevitable, but there is hope that we might evolve beyond the repetitious cycle eventually (hence my allusion to the possibility of a spiral life instead, in which the society is not moving only in two dimensions, but rather, in three, and that the next time we come around to Point F [Empire] may be after we have ascended further toward an enlightened and educated society which will be able to avoid at least some of the excesses of the last time we were at Point F).
And to claim that nobody ever did argue for the extermination of all TS members is simply not true (although I guess this claims were later reversed) kodachikuno for example wrote: "I gotta say to the ones advocating being 'nice' to the Tal Shiar remnants... Yeah... I'll 'be nice' and give them a swift and painless death. "
It may not be meant in that way, but it sound so, or am I wrong? How could that work out and what picture it suggest if it comes to the ears of the TS-members? Clearly not in favor of the Republic, I would say. As do your aggressive behaviour against anyone who argue for a greater inclusion of Imperial Elements in the Republic, which would come with some changes of course. This would be the cost if the Republic should become a representation for more and more Romulans, including those who still honour the imperial past.
I don't think kodachikuno would like for you to associate him with me; we are not exactly allies, although he is more rational than some other opponents I have faced in these forum battles. He is not loyal to the New Republic, unless he has changed his tune since last we crossed pens.
"However, as for the scattered cells of the Tal'Shiar, no. There is no place in the New Republic for a gang of fascist thugs terrorizing the honest and law-abiding citizens of the Republic. For any intelligence needs, the Tal'Diann's Military Intelligence branch, and Militia Intelligence, are more than capable to meet those. A free people has no need for a Secret Police force.
Donatra could be liberated from the Borg and given a chance to choose; I suspect she would not side with the Tal'Shiar, but she might well decide to attempt to resurrect the Imperial Romulan State, and syphon off disaffected elements of both the New Republic and the rotting corpse of the Star Empire. By no means am I under any illusions as to Donatra's character; she was, like many in the Imperial Star Navy and the government of the RSE itself for the past several decades, out for herself first and foremost, but she went about it in a much saner manner than Taris, Sela, or Hakeev. The forces of the Empire have had ample opportunity to change sides, and the door is still open to any who be sincere. But honestly, those who still remain in service to what is left of the Star Empire (which isn't much apart from forces under control of the Tal'Shiar) have made their choice, and they must now live (or die) with it."
And your own words did not seem to suggest a real reconciliation, open talks in which both side give something towards each other. But any treaty between warring factions need such concessions, unconditional surrender works only after total defeat (which often mean war to the last breath). And words like "have made their choice, and they must now live (or die) with it." suggest only two things - either you accept that the Romulan people will be split into hostile factions forever (which is nothing anyone could wish) or we come to the "die" part of your words, what is exactly what you now deny...:D
The "scattered cells of the Tal'Shiar" refer to the organization in its current state, and "a gang of fascist thugs terrorizing the honest and law-abiding citizens of the Republic" refers to the Tal'Shiar as an organization as it has behaved in the past and would like to continue to behave. It does not refer to every member of the Tal'Shiar, and what with both Militia Intelligence and the Tal'Diann, the Tal'Shiar as an organization would be unnecessary by virtue of redundancy. Do not confuse the singular use of "Tal'Shiar" (referring to the organization itself) with the collective use of "Tal'Shiar" (referring to those who are part of the organization). The organization has no place in a Republic; those who have been part of it might, but as I said in my previous post in reply to catoblepas, history cautions us to not be overly eager to forgive or give the benefit of the doubt to these persons.
It's also disingenuous to focus on the final phrase of what I said while conveniently ignoring that I also said:
"The forces of the Empire have had ample opportunity to change sides, and the door is still open to any who be sincere."
(emphasis added)
as I said in another thread, there is the possibility in Star Wars Online to play for the Empire - which seem not a very "nice" state, too
There are four Imperial classes in SWTOR. Two of them are Sith, the elite of the Empire who can literally do whatever they want, as long as they don't step on the toes of their superiors. There's no real equivalent to space wizard samurai in Romulan culture. One is an independent contractor who isn't part of the Imperial structure, and who could care less about their ideals (just their credits). Might be interesting to see the RSE from an outsider's perspective, but that's not really what people want.
One is a member of a Tal Shiar organization . . . which basically exists because the rest of the Empire is so dysfunctional that it requires a secret organization just to clean up after it's incredibly stupid, rage-tripping leaders. As loyal as everyone in your group is, and as much as they legitimately believe in what they think the Empire is all about, it quickly becomes apparent that the Empire exists solely to benefit the Sith. Normal people like you are tools, to be used and discarded, as you eventually are used and discarded. In the end, you have to leave the Empire, and go rogue. You're now fighting for a nation of psychopaths, one you just proved doesn't care about you, and for it's ideals that you have just saw were always incredibly shallow lies designed to dupe you. You're basically the Empire's battered wife.
While that's an interesting story (probably the best one in the Empire), it could be boiled down to an brief essay on why the Empire was a bad idea in the first place. I might be able to enjoy that sort of thing, I wonder if that's really what the people asking for an Star Empire faction want.
TNG Romulans as they were in TNG are such one-dimensional, shallow antagonists that I simply cannot imagine them as protagonists. I can imagine it going down two ways.
The first is that some major changes happen to make flesh them out. Maybe you liberate Dontara, and try to put her back on the throne, and have a civil war with the Romulan Imperial State . . . but then, you've just recreated what we have now, without the word "republic" or 5000 page posts about who's fault the Sundering was.
Otherwise, I see them trying to let you be Hakeev, riding around in a big Borgified ship, chewing the scenery. I'm not sure what the point of that would be. We already have a faction that's an aggressive, sneaky alien empire with cloaking devices and birds of prey, and they are far better developed. There's really no point in making a faction for people who want to play a Klingon with a cleaner ship interior and less relatability (and a worse haircut).
I'm not saying that being a K-Mart brand Gul Dukat wouldn't be fun for a mission or two (that's probably why we have an entire Tal Shiar infiltration arc), but I don't really see the writers sticking with it for long, for the same reasons most writers never touch that sort of thing: it ultimately boils down to a very simple and very shallow power fantasy. Once that wears off, there is very little drama and nothing for an audience to connect to.
Ultimately, what's most interesting about villains is their downfalls. I would play the downfall of the Empire from the inside, most definitely. However, I think that's the only real story that exists for the Empire at this point.
TNG Romulans as they were in TNG are such one-dimensional, shallow antagonists that I simply cannot imagine them as protagonists...
I think that ultimately the problem with the TNG Romulans, and a major cause of why the Romulans cause division like we see here, is that they never really had a recurring character we could get a more sympathetic picture of them with. Like I said waaaaaaaaay back in this thread, we wouldn't exactly see the TNG Klingons in a very good light if we didn't have Worf around, would we? Much of what we'd be left with is Klingon politics, which...doesn't exactly portray a lot of Klingons as honorable individuals, to say the least. I think Worf served an important purpose in providing another perspective on the Klingons, as opposed to, say, that of the House of Duras we saw so much.
The Romulans did not have that. There were more sympathetic characters among them, of course, but they were always one-offs, as opposed to recurring characters like Tomalak and Sela.
Kind of a shame, that. Think of the internet arguments we could have avoided! :P
Again, I think it needs saying that I don't put much stock in the soft canon-at-best portrayals you are drawing from. They rather severely contradict the description of events in the Time of Awakening as shown in the shows, which has been rather consistent with itself-a global nuclear war of ideology. As is, I have no reason to believe they are any more canon than the description of Romulans from the Star Trek: The Next Generation Role Playing Game, for example. Likewise I don't think there's any sort of obligation to include ships or materials from the various trek games-as much as I'd like a Winged Defender class or a QeylIS BetleH class, or as much as I like the storyline of the Klingon Academy game I mentioned earlier.
My position is and has been that we need more 'Hard canon' depictions of Romulans.
Your tendancy to cherry pick from the shows is noted. The large majority of Romulan portrayals as 'bad guys' is not indicative of the majority, but the handful of 'good guy' Romulans somehow are.
Well you'll have to refresh my mmemory, because you still haven't provided that link, and I distinctly remember you trotting out the whole 'anyone who doesn't like the republic is an insignificant minority and should be ignored'(paraphrase) argument on several occasions.
Almost everything about the Romulans seems influenced by the military. Their government is military, their intelligence service(s) have their own personal fleets, they have a massive armed forces besides being supposedly isolationist, and have been involved in several wars with the other alpha quadrant powers. Even their scientists wear military uniforms. It's quite fair to use the term 'militarized' in relation to the RSE.
Even Klingon nannies are trained in the arts of war. One of them killed a Klingon assassin in TNG. Their entire culture revolves around the warrior lifestyle.
These aren't Humans we are talking about here. IMO Romulan culture has a completely different set of ideals and cultural obligations going by the shows. A people used to killing infants with birth defects, numerous wars, and spying by the intelligence services are likely to be a bit more 'hardened' than the federation.
I elaborated my position on your constant name dropping of your fan site in a followup post, as much as you might try to strawman that. I may dislike the 'advertising for recruits' aspect involved, but that wasn't what I was specifically criticizing, whatever your paranoid assertions are.
If you really have no problem with Tal Shiar reintegration, then that begs the question on why you have been arguing against it so vehemently for so many posts. I suspect that it has something to do with your distaste for allowing those with a more TNG-Romulan set of ideals and behavior into the fold.
Romulans in ENT were rather close to the TNG-onwards portrayals. One could just as easily argue that it was the TOS Romulans that were aberrant.
As long as they aren't planning a coup, the TNG-era paradigm shouldn't be blacklisted in a supposedly free society. And if the 'nice' Romulans really are the majority, then they shouldn't have anything to fear in an elected government.
The only difference between Paramilitary and Military is official recognition as military by the government. There's no reason to think that the Tal Shiar lacks this in STO, considering they absorbed all the branches of the Star Empire's armed forces. Even if that were not the case, they would be the de-facto military of the RSE in STO.
And going back to what I said above, ...posts in this forum.
This is your opinion. I could say much the same of you. My impression is that you constantly shift goalposts to your own ends and split hairs over irrelevant minutiae like the demographic breakdown of those who left Vuclan or whether or not the Tal Shiar is a military or paramilitary force in STO for posts at end to avoid addressing the issues being discussed directly and endless backpeddling and reinvention of your stances.
Also, my stance remains that as much as I dislike the Romulans from the Rihannsu novels and Romulan Republic, and how awful an idea I think it was to retcon them into existence into a game that until then had followed the TNG-style of depicting Romulans. I'd rather have TNG-style Romulan portrayals added to the Republic-and am not requesting and do not expect them to remove the Republic and plug the RSE into place where they were.
Bringing the RSE remnants into the fold under the Republic is something that needs to be done in order to tie up the loose plot threads that is the Romulan civil war. And it would be the perfect opportunity to inject some more TNG-era Romulan mindsets and behavior into the Republic. Best of both worlds Republic/Rihannsu fans get their Romulans, and fans of the TNG-style Romulans get their sneakier, nastier Romulans.
That being said...I enjoy these little scraps of RP in our posts.
And yet I sense a lack of impending Tal'Diann boots kicking down the door to my estate on New Romulus. We have been enjoying no small amount of patronage from sympathetic members of the echelons of the republic, and have secured more than adequate enough funding and documents granting us broad powers in the pursuit of our agendas, not counting of course-the 'unofficial' influence we have through our agents in Starfleet, the KDF, and the various branches of the government and through the usual 'insurance' gathered on various members of those organizations. Our present and future position as the preeminent intelligence agency in matters both civilian and military in regards to the Republic is quite secure.
Your organization was quite inconvenient to undermine to the point where we can openly challenge the authority of the Tal'Diann if and where we wish to. Clearly a worthy enough opponent. In the tradition of Tomalak, I'm sure a suitably comfortable estate will be found for you in the event of your inevitable exile when Tal'diann becomes obsolete.
The Romulan Star Empire will not Die. It like the Klingon empire has been integrated into the Star trek universe too much and too long to remove it, without irreparable damage to the franchise. Nor will the Republic representation of sto ever take hold and supercede/destroy it, in the hard canon ip. The Idiotic destruction of Romulus in recent movies is a setback and not a small one at that, but the difference with the destruction of Vulcan in the alternate universe, (which incidentally would also hold true if the main universe Vulcan was destroyed) From Romulus in the main one, is that the RSE is a large intersteller Empire unlike the Vulcans. It will survive J.J.'s Grandstanding, And It will survive this game.
"And that's the way it is." to quote Journilist Walter Cronkite.
No ridiculous bluring of in character and out of character posts for the sake of showboating ones supposed ideology to state this fact in this topic.
The Romulan Star Empire will not Die. It like the Klingon empire has been integrated into the Star trek universe too much and too long to remove it, without irreparable damage to the franchise. Nor will the Republic representation of sto ever take hold and supercede/destroy it, in the hard canon ip. The Idiotic destruction of Romulus in recent movies is a setback and not a small one at that, but the difference with the destruction of Vulcan in the alternate universe, (which incidentally would also hold true if the main universe Vulcan was destroyed) From Romulus in the main one, is that the RSE is a large intersteller Empire unlike the Vulcans. It will survive J.J.'s Grandstanding, And It will survive this game.
"And that's the way it is." to quote Journilist Walter Cronkite.
No ridiculous bluring of in character and out of character posts for the sake of showboating ones supposed ideology to state this fact in this topic.
I agree, RP elements of posts should definitely be better segregated from the rest of the arguments being discussed here. I shall endeavor to be better in this regard.
We're all part of the Republic whether we want to be or not. There is no story line in the game where you serve Empress Sela ... Romulan faction players all work with D'Tan.
I'd love it if the devs remastered the Romulan faction episodes so we can choose to side with the Empire, but that isn't the way things are right now.
I grew up watching the Romulan Empire on TOS and TNG/DS9, so I would prefer to join forces with the Empire rather than the rebel scum that is the Republic, but there's no point in going on about that.
In the immortal words of Captain Sisko: "It may not be what you believe, but that doesn't make it wrong."
Don't believe the lies in this forum. I am NOT an ARC user. I play STO on Steam or not at all.
We're all part of the Republic whether we want to be or not. There is no story line in the game where you serve Empress Sela ... Romulan faction players all work with D'Tan.
I'd love it if the devs remastered the Romulan faction episodes so we can choose to side with the Empire, but that isn't the way things are right now.
I grew up watching the Romulan Empire on TOS and TNG/DS9, so I would prefer to join forces with the Empire rather than the rebel scum that is the Republic, but there's no point in going on about that.
Yeah, I don't have much hope for that, but there is least a sliver of hope IMO for more classically TNG/DS9 Romulans being more represented in the Republic, with the shenanigans the Republic is getting up to with the Dyson sphere missions.
Hopefully future material will give the option to act more in line with those Romulans if the player chooses to do so.
We likely will never get a playable RSE faction, but I think the Republic could stand to get a few more veins of the empire running through it.
I grew up watching the Romulan Empire on TOS and TNG/DS9, so I would prefer to join forces with the Empire
And do what, exactly? What is this compelling story we're all apparently missing out on?
I mean, yes, the SWTOR example above shows it can be done, but only two of the four stories offered were more than shallow power fantasies.
Maybe you like that sort of thing, more power to you . . . but I can already tell you how it turns out. I can literally recite the entire story right here.
First, you get a new enemy faction that's even more evil than you to fight, but a lot more low-key. This takes up most of your time early on. Maybe it's something like pirates or slavers or terrorists like the Maquis.
Occasionally, you get to fight the good guys, I guess the Federation or Klingons in this case. STO would probably let you fight them for real, unlike say, Klingon Academy, where all the Federation stuff was a training exercise. You might get to cause some damage to them, but it will never be brought up in their own storylines, so who cares?
When you do, you get a few platitudes about how they're the real villains, because they're "corrupt" and don't stand by their high-minded values (whereas the Empire is steadfast in standing beside their incredibly impractical and stupid values).
Ultimately, there will be some bland intrigue and predictable betrayals, and from then on you're fighting your own faction. Because this is how "bad guy" stories always go. Everyone will nod along with this incredibly predictable twist, because Romulans, amirite? Ultimately, you will be the one who comes out on top, and will prove the true champion of all those values that you really shouldn't think too hard about (and not just because the Tal Shiar forbids you from thinking too hard about it on pain of death).
Now, even though this does work in SWTOR to an extent, there's a lot of other things there to make it more palpable that we just can't do. There's no light/dark side to the Star Trek universe. They can't do party member interactions, because . . . well, look at how much you obviously care for Tovan. I can only imagine how you'd feel if you had a chance to "comfort" him over how far Charva has fallen. It's not really practical to have multiple storylines for each faction like it is with TOR, so you don't get other perspectives on the RSE to the extent that people would want (people still say the Tal Shiar is black and white in this game, even though Charva seems to have been written in purely to show that they aren't).
What it boils down to is, as much as fans love the Romulans, they seem to be absolute hell to write about. Look at what Patrick Stewart and Michael Piller had to say about them, during the making of Insurrection. Look at the novels, which split them into a "good" and "evil" faction just like STO does.
You kind of have to do something like that. You just can't do that much with the Romulan Empire. They are villains who's initial appeal is their similarity to Vulcans and (less in-universe than in the writing) to humanity. In TNG, they seem to have existed only so they didn't have to invent new villains-of-the-week all the time. They don't stand up on their own.
Good thing they went with those awesome new aliens for Insurrection instead of the Romulans, they would have made for godawful antagonists, unlike those amazing ones we *did* get (end sarcasm)
Writing Romulan antagonists is easy-it's not that much different than writing Cardassian antagonists. As someone brought up before (might have even been you, I don't recall) For some reason although Romulans were quite popular with fans, the directors and writers etc hated Romulans, even as they devoted more and more screentime to their replacements, the Cardassians. (who turned out to also be quite popular-imagine that).
Klingon Academy and other Trek games that let you play as the 'bad guy' prove that there's a lot of mileage that can be gotten out of 'bad guy' factions. IMO all the "problems" you think playing 'bad' in a game invites have been proven false across a myriad of games, not just Trek. In fact, the Romulans, along with other 'bad guy' factions such as the Klingons, and more rarely the Cardassians have been staples of Trek games for ages now.
The real reason why we couldn't have a playable Star Empire in the game was because Cryptic analyzed the number of Klingon players compared to the Federation and decided that 'bad guy' factions just don't sell well enough to warrant two of them in game. This is why they reinvented them as the more kid-friendly Republic. It's also probably why they decided to reign in the nastier aspects of the KDF and ended the war. (now whether or not the lower player numbers were the result of a vicious cycle of less content meaning less players meaning less content....that's another debate)
And power fantasy....really? One could argue that the Republic storyline is a power fantasy much more easily with all the things the player and the republic get to do in the relative blink of an eye.- all while actively hammering the player with how good and pure the Republic is and how despicable and unredeemable the Star Empire is....the whole faction borders on 'Sue' territory in so many ways.
Here I have a different opinion. I liked actually General Chang much more than Worf, anyway that he was a hard-core imperialist and involved in a coup. I think Chang was a better representive for the Klingon military elite than the (mentally) "half-Klingon" Worf...
shaanithegreen
You are right there are no sith-like in the Star Empire, but high-ranking military with some backing of the TS would have a similiar independent role - they could act more or less freely as long as they did not really cross with someone much, much higher in rank. And that, I guess, could also said about captains of other species, since even a Klingon captain could not do what he want (or he become an outlaw like the Duras-sisters).
And the Empire for Romulans must not be exactly the same as it was in NG - if they include the Shinzon-coup and even the destruction of Romulos etc., than it would be more a Empire on the brink of destruction. You would fight for a fraction which has more in common with the Star Wars Empire after Endor than with that in Old Republic - but could that not be appealing? Sometimes the Empire was at its best when the chances of survival were bad, when they rallied behind people like Thrawn and his second-in-command. A Empire with charismatic and desperate military leaders and political elites, united in their struggle for survival, their proud of the past and vision for the future - but also sometimes fighting over the right way and who should lead. That would mean a story of inner struggle (to keep the Empire united) and outside warfare against all the vultures who like to prey on an obvious easy target. A story of brutal military campaigns, intrigues and power struggle, alliances with unlikely partners etc. The fight for every system to remain in the Empire, covert and open strikes against rival Empires etc. I guess there would be quiet several people who would have like that. The Republic is a bit too nice for such a feeling, with making peace with the Feds, the Klingons and the Remans, crying "Freedom" out loudly when the cry "unity" and "power" seems much more important. A good example are the Epoh. Not as such, but that the one scientist claim that several Romulans see the Epoh as symbol for their live - well, that is in my eyes not very appealing and sound even VERY pitty for people who once proudly claimed they had walked under the wings of the raptor.
catoblepasbeta and astro2244
Perhaps we should in future mark in-play and out-play sections like in that way The Empire will live forever
(which is character-spoken) and
I disagree with that description, because of...
By the way, catoblepasbeta, the way you explain the situation of now make a lot of sense to me. Sad as it is...
Protogoth
"I'm pretty sure I didn't say "Empires are bad," much less did I yell it. I may have teased at some point with a phrase like "Empire are bad, mkay?" (which is a sort of meme found often in Anglo satire, and which should not be taken at face value as any sort of serious absolute declaration). I am no fan of imperialism, that much is true, but that is not identical with an absolute "All S are P" statement such as you have alleged I made. I also never said that The Star Empire was rotten throughout its history. I have, on the contrary, said that it began to rot and that eventually the rotting and festering destroyed it from the inside. I have also stated repeatedly that the Star Empire as it was in TOS was considerably different from its later manifestations and that there was a time when it was possessed of honor."
Well, before you made such statements, you should look into your own words:
"The Star Empire, such of it as remains which is not the Tall'Shiar, does not want to unite with the Republic. To do so would be to stop being imperialists. What they -- and the Tal'Shiar -- want is to destroy the Republic and either slaughter or enslave all who have supported it. There can be no "greater good for the Romulan people" by inviting these persons to join the Republic. They would not settle for it; they wish to dominate, to subjugate, to enslave, to torture, to kill. That is what EMPIRES do."
What of the statement "that is what Empires do" - not "that is what Empires of these or that type do" (to dominate, to subjugate, to enslave, to torzure, to kill) is not a one-sided bias bashing of ALL Empires? Sorry, but at this point I can see nothing other than I described...;)
And about your claim that you are no friend with kodachikuno - that was not the sole point. You had claimed that NO ONE here had argued for such a thing like summary executions. And I proofed that this was not 100 percent correct.
One could argue that the Republic storyline is a power fantasy much more easily with all the things the player and the republic get to do in the relative blink of an eye.- all while actively hammering the player with how good and pure the Republic is and how despicable and unredeemable the Star Empire is....the whole faction borders on 'Sue' territory in so many ways.
Let us not forget that in pretty much all 4 of the republic stories you can be more corrupt and evil than any of the 4 Sith Empire stories, and half the time be rewarded with light side points for it. The trooper plot is probably the one that shows it the strongest but either of the dark side Jedi stories show plenty as well.
I don't think kodachikuno would like for you to associate him with me; we are not exactly allies, although he is more rational than some other opponents I have faced in these forum battles. He is not loyal to the New Republic, unless he has changed his tune since last we crossed pens.
meh I don't mind ya too much. A bit pompous and hypocritical and way too friggin wordy but one can hardly argue your grasp of the Romulan language or the little bits of lore you choose to accept.
And no, I still stand firmly on wanting the Republic and its incompetent, glory hounding, leaders dead.
people seem to have not gotten the view of the Tal shiar in STO, the Tal shiar are no longer working with the Empire per say in fact they are working against Sela (though behind her back) i have seen it that Sela only know a little about what the Tal shiar is really doing, her words before her abduction seem to indicate that she wasn't fully aware of Hakeev and Taris plans or how fully engrossed they were with the Iconians.
Remember some of the story in STO is based on novels after nemesis and after Shinzons death the Tal shiar were attempting to gain dominance over the empire and The vast majority of hostile Romulan NPCs encountered in the game are affiliated with the Tal Shiar.
my point being is that the Tal shiar are doing ANYTHING to gain power and restore what they believe is Romulan power, its likely that most of the Romulan Military that hasn't been taken over by them is simply defending what power the Empire has left, or has defected to the Republic.
As fore the republic itself Da'tan said that while he wants unification that cant happen till all romulans are united together in the New Roumlas entrance video, and i doubt reunification means he wants Romulans to become vulcans again but for them to rejoin their long lost brothers but still have their passion and emotions that they left Vulcan to preserve in the first place.
I may not be explain it well but i think the Republic isn't a bunch of Space hippies (scanning plants over and over again isn't hippish, they are after all building on a once poisoned world and need to make sure they dont end up eating something or expose themselves to something that could cause a mass plague) the Republic is going back to what they were before the Empire became what it was a society where once vulcans could live free of Logic and explore their emotions.
"It appears we have lost our sex appeal, captain."- Tuvok
Few here use the word space hippies as far as I mentioned, and I am not so sure about that "going back" - and if that is the thing many Romulans really want. Some may, but many other would prefer to rebuild the Empire (with a weaker and controlled Tal Shiar). There is no much traces which show that something like a "Romulan Republic" was ever a focus of wishes and was well remembered, instead I think the Star Empire was reality for centuries - according to some books I think even for over thousand years (do not know if that is canon). I think it would be more easy to rally the Imperial Remnants and even parts of the TS (which is hardly a monolithic organization, and that even more afer Hakevs death) for one cause if the "Republic" claims and act a little bit more Empire-like, proclaiming proudly and with the support of old elites that it see himself as heir of the Empire, but reaches out to all other remnants. Inculde them by making offers, not alienating them.
The Republic is a bit too nice for such a feeling, with making peace with the Feds, the Klingons and the Remans, crying "Freedom" out loudly when the cry "unity" and "power" seems much more important.
It should be noted that the status quo for the Star Empire and Federation was peaceful non-involvement. The Federation and Star Empire never fought a single war. They had a HANDFUL of skirmishes over the entire history of the Federation, most of which was the Star Empire testing the Federation, though the Federation caused a few Incidents themselves.
Further, the Federation clearly saw the Romulans as something close to an ally (or at least, a non-hostile power) in the middle 23rd century. High ranking Starfleet Admirals, military personnel and the Federation President had no problem about talking about a high level, highly secretive potential military operation in front of the Romulan Ambassador ("Star Trek VI") (An interesting aside, this period of time fits within the supposed reign of Ael post the Rihannsu series, who would have been very friendly with the Federation and likely would have taken a personal interest in the rescue of one Captain Kirk, and the inclusion of the Romulan Ambassador there could be a way of the Federation obliquely telling her "we're considering our options, you don't need to do anything, please don't star a war with the Klingons because of your friendship".). I find this situation also very interesting in that by the point of Star Trek VI, TNG was on the air and had established the "new" Romulans. STVI specifically used the old makeup and had a different relationship between the Federation and Star Empire than TNG did, indicating there was definitely a major shift between the periods. Further evidence of a more open and peaceful RSE in the mid 23rd is in... I hate citing this... Star Trek V, as they were involved with the failed effort on Nimbus.
So its perfectly normal for the Romulans to be as peace, even friendly with, the Federation. Sure they bicker over borders and sometimes shoot at each other, you can't let your guard down, but the Romulan's involvement with the Federation has always been very weird. They don't appear to want to conquer (aside, maybe from Vulcan, though how much backing Sela's plan had is... questionable), they keep them on their toes, they have even turned a blind eye towards treaty breaking by the Federation when they clearly could have made major cases out of it (DS9: "The Warrior's Way") and sometimes they do things that seem more like they're making a "hard decision" that the Federation can't (DS9: "Visionary").
Further, the Federation offered aid and respite after Hobus, though some Romulans were upset that they didn't "do enough", the fact is they did help.
It seems to me that the entire Federation/Romulan relationship is actually a good example of the old adage "Good fences make good neighbors.". Because the Neutral Zone was so firmly entrenched for both sides, all the conflict between them centered on infractions and disagreements about that area. Both sides expanded more or less away from that zone as to not antagonize the other, and so the Federation and Romulans did not conflict much due to the forceful separation of their Sphere's of Influence. When did they conflict? When their Spheres of Influence overlapped and they had different end goals. That does not make them enemies, merely two empires looking out for their own self interest.
Now, I will grant the urge to make peace with the Klingons is much harder to swallow given the long and bloody history between them, and the multiple recent invasions Klingons had staged per the STO timeline (it's one of the reasons I play a Fed!Rom). However, simple realpolitick forces them to make nice. At the time of their decision to play the balance, the Romulans cannot simply side with the Federation. Mol'Rihan in to close to the Klingon border, and militarily they're to weak. While the Third (or fourth? I'm not sure) Federation-Klingon War was more or less a stalemate between the Fedrats and Klinks, the Romulans were a soft target, and the Klingons could make easy headway into them if they'd only sided with the Federation. So they had to grit their teeth and play nice with them and the Federation.
What it boils down to is, as much as fans love the Romulans, they seem to be absolute hell to write about. Look at what Patrick Stewart and Michael Piller had to say about them, during the making of Insurrection. Look at the novels, which split them into a "good" and "evil" faction just like STO does.
I think the real problem is that its hard to write about TNG style Romulans who were merely "antagonists" and such a police state that it is hard to make them anything but antagonists rather than protagonists. There's been many novels written about the Romulans before the current novels split them into two groups. The Rihannsu series being the first (which was HUGELY popular with the fans to the point of the petitioning that it be made canon, while Roddenberry absolutely HATED it to the point of trying to get the "Star Trek" label removed from the novels). Vulcan's Heart and the Vulcan's Soul trilogy also come to mind, both exploring the state of the Star Empire when it is more open (Vulcan's Heart taking place in the late 23rd Century and Vulcan's Soul taking place in the Time of Awakening/the Sundering and the immediate post Dominion War era, when the Romulans were officially the allies of the Federation).
If anybody has seen the King Arthur Movie with Clive Owens there's a scene where Arthur is burying one of his knights and Arthur is depressed talking to Guenivere. She tells him that Rome is dead. That where he was at the wall that Britain was the last outpost for everything he held dear.
Guess what kids. THE ROMULAN EMPIRE IS DEAD. Or damn near and in it's death throes.
There is no strength left there. Star Fleet has repeatedly trashed it's fleets, so has the Republic D'Tan has started. The Tal Shiar can only move in the shadows.
There is nothing left there except squabbling people trying to remember what real power was.
Piece of advice, let it die.
Star Trek Battles member. Want to roll with a good group of people regardless of fleets and not have to worry about DPS while doing STFs? Come join the channel and join in the fun!
talonxv
That is a bad example I think. Real History is far different from that film. First, even the western Empire last some decades after the withdrawal from Britain, and it could still bite hard (ask the Huns and their allies who had to face the forces under Aetius command in France). Second, "Rome" lived on after the main forces left Britain for about 1.000 years - because the Eastern Empire still claimed (with certain right) to be the rightful heir of the Empire, or better BE ROME. And they destroyed indeed several of the Barbarian Groups who destroyed the Western Empire (Vandals, the Gothic Empire in Italy). So Rome as an idea and Empire lived long after the walls of the capital had fallen.
So the idea of Romulan-Roman Empire suits me very well - the Romulans will have their revenge...:D
peregry
But what is with the "war of the first contact" which is mentioned several times, in the very early days? Was he later erased from history? And did not Romulans and Federation clash over influence in the Klingon Empire, did not the Romulan Ambassador take part in the plans to undermine the peace between Klingons and Federation, and what is with the ship Sela's mother was on - destroyed at Khitomer? I am sure that was not the only examples. Peaceful non-involvement sounds in another way, I would say. And was not the Klingon-Romulan alliance very much directed against the Federation?
Strange definition for friendly...:D
Even single ships which were destroyed (what surely happened sometimes) mean every time the loss of dozen, hundreds or even more than 1.000 men and women or even more on one or even both sides. So I would say it was even a bit worse than the cat-and-mice-game between Soviet and US planes and Subs during the Cold War.
So I would say Cold War, which on some times was near to becoming hot (and was sometimes even fought direct) is the better description...
I think the real problem is that its hard to write about TNG style Romulans who were merely "antagonists" and such a police state that it is hard to make them anything but antagonists rather than protagonists. There's been many novels written about the Romulans before the current novels split them into two groups. The Rihannsu series being the first (which was HUGELY popular with the fans to the point of the petitioning that it be made canon, while Roddenberry absolutely HATED it to the point of trying to get the "Star Trek" label removed from the novels). Vulcan's Heart and the Vulcan's Soul trilogy also come to mind, both exploring the state of the Star Empire when it is more open (Vulcan's Heart taking place in the late 23rd Century and Vulcan's Soul taking place in the Time of Awakening/the Sundering and the immediate post Dominion War era, when the Romulans were officially the allies of the Federation).
Again, much the same can be said about the Cardassians. The Cardassians, were widely popular *as* antagonists. All the spying, arrogance, the police state, the militarism-all of it added to their character and set them apart from the Federation and Klingons. If one can write good Cardassian characters and stories, than Romulans should not be a problem. In fact, Romulans seem to have been rather popular despite the fact they got sidelined by the Klingons and Cardassians later on.
I do not think the Romulans were really anything "close to an ally" with the Federation. I point to the attempted invasion of Vulcan-twice(if you count ENT), the attempt to annex one of Bajor's moons during the dominion war, the assassination that was necessary to drag the Romulans into the Dominion war, the attempt to destroy all life on Earth in Nemesis, and the numerous acts of sabotage and espionage throughout the time period, stretching back as far as ENT era. It's more of a cold war situation if anything, with more than a few instances where it became rather hot.
If anybody has seen the King Arthur Movie with Clive Owens there's a scene where Arthur is burying one of his knights and Arthur is depressed talking to Guenivere. She tells him that Rome is dead. That where he was at the wall that Britain was the last outpost for everything he held dear.
Guess what kids. THE ROMULAN EMPIRE IS DEAD. Or damn near and in it's death throes.
There is no strength left there. Star Fleet has repeatedly trashed it's fleets, so has the Republic D'Tan has started. The Tal Shiar can only move in the shadows.
There is nothing left there except squabbling people trying to remember what real power was.
Piece of advice, let it die.
That film was horrible and had nothing to do with the historical account. Roman culture, ideals, and values far outlived the Roman pullout from England and elsewhere.
Also, it's evident you haven't been reading this thread. Nobody really expects the Star Empire to spring forth from the ground fully healed and ready to take on the KDF and Starfleet at this particular point in the narrative. (although pre-LOR, that was another thing)
Whether or not the Republic can reunite with the Imperial Remnants and/or gain a little spark of what made TNG/DS9 Romulans so memorable is what's at stake here.
talonxv
That is a bad example I think. Real History is far different from that film. First, even the western Empire last some decades after the withdrawal from Britain, and it could still bite hard (ask the Huns and their allies who had to face the forces under Aetius command in France). Second, "Rome" lived on after the main forces left Britain for about 1.000 years - because the Eastern Empire still claimed (with certain right) to be the rightful heir of the Empire, or better BE ROME. And they destroyed indeed several of the Barbarian Groups who destroyed the Western Empire (Vandals, the Gothic Empire in Italy). So Rome as an idea and Empire lived long after the walls of the capital had fallen.
So the idea of Romulan-Roman Empire suits me very well - the Romulans will have their revenge...:D
peregry
But what is with the "war of the first contact" which is mentioned several times, in the very early days? Was he later erased from history? And did not Romulans and Federation clash over influence in the Klingon Empire, did not the Romulan Ambassador take part in the plans to undermine the peace between Klingons and Federation, and what is with the ship Sela's mother was on - destroyed at Khitomer? I am sure that was not the only examples. Peaceful non-involvement sounds in another way, I would say. And was not the Klingon-Romulan alliance very much directed against the Federation?
Strange definition for friendly...:D
Even single ships which were destroyed (what surely happened sometimes) mean every time the loss of dozen, hundreds or even more than 1.000 men and women or even more on one or even both sides. So I would say it was even a bit worse than the cat-and-mice-game between Soviet and US planes and Subs during the Cold War.
So I would say Cold War, which on some times was near to becoming hot (and was sometimes even fought direct) is the better description...
Again, much the same can be said about the Cardassians. The Cardassians, were widely popular *as* antagonists. All the spying, arrogance, the police state, the militarism-all of it added to their character and set them apart from the Federation and Klingons. If one can write good Cardassian characters and stories, than Romulans should not be a problem. In fact, Romulans seem to have been rather popular despite the fact they got sidelined by the Klingons and Cardassians later on.
I do not think the Romulans were really anything "close to an ally" with the Federation. I point to the attempted invasion of Vulcan-twice(if you count ENT), the attempt to annex one of Bajor's moons during the dominion war, the assassination that was necessary to drag the Romulans into the Dominion war, the attempt to destroy all life on Earth in Nemesis, and the numerous acts of sabotage and espionage throughout the time period, stretching back as far as ENT era. It's more of a cold war situation if anything, with more than a few instances where it became rather hot.
That film was horrible and had nothing to do with the historical account. Roman culture, ideals, and values far outlived the Roman pullout from England and elsewhere.
Also, it's evident you haven't been reading this thread. Nobody really expects the Star Empire to spring forth from the ground fully healed and ready to take on the KDF and Starfleet at this particular point in the narrative. (although pre-LOR, that was another thing)
Whether or not the Republic can reunite with the Imperial Remnants and/or gain a little spark of what made TNG/DS9 Romulans so memorable is what's at stake here.
I use an example from a movie(never once saying it was history EVER) and I get taken completely out of context.
Star Trek Battles member. Want to roll with a good group of people regardless of fleets and not have to worry about DPS while doing STFs? Come join the channel and join in the fun!
peregry
But what is with the "war of the first contact" which is mentioned several times, in the very early days? Was he later erased from history? And did not Romulans and Federation clash over influence in the Klingon Empire, did not the Romulan Ambassador take part in the plans to undermine the peace between Klingons and Federation, and what is with the ship Sela's mother was on - destroyed at Khitomer? I am sure that was not the only examples. Peaceful non-involvement sounds in another way, I would say. And was not the Klingon-Romulan alliance very much directed against the Federation?
Strange definition for friendly...:D
Even single ships which were destroyed (what surely happened sometimes) mean every time the loss of dozen, hundreds or even more than 1.000 men and women or even more on one or even both sides. So I would say it was even a bit worse than the cat-and-mice-game between Soviet and US planes and Subs during the Cold War.
So I would say Cold War, which on some times was near to becoming hot (and was sometimes even fought direct) is the better description...
Note what I said:
The Federation and Romulans never fought war.
Canonically, the only war we know the Romulan Empire fought that's pertinent to this was specifically: The Earth/Romulan War, which was fought before the Federation existed as an entity.. I've often mentioned the Earth/Romulan War in many threads where I pointed out the same thing I just did (I neglected to mention it this time because I thought folks would remember that detail since I'd mentioned it many times before, my bad for assuming it was common knowledge).
Clashes over spheres of influence are not the same as open hostility. To use a real world example, the US and China are constantly conflicting over spheres of influence in the Pacific Rim, yet nobody calls them "hostile" or "enemies". Having conflicting interests does not inherently make two powers enemies. The Federation and Klingons often conflicted over methods and end goals, but since Khitomer they were at peace.
Of course, I mentioned all of this, noting that they've had minor skirmishes, most started by the Romulans.
As to Star Trek VI. We do not know the extent of the Romulan involvement in the joint Starfleet/KDF conspiracy to undermine what would become the Khitomer Accord. We know only that one of the conspirators was "The Romulan Ambassador". This could mean it was state sanctioned, though given how Romulans operated, there was likely no official sanction given to maintain plausible deniability in case things did not go to plan. He may have also been acting completely independently of the Senate with the RSE truly being in the dark about it too. It should also be noted that the Federation did not consider him a security risk for some reason, as he was present when Colonel West and one of Starfleet's Admirals briefed, the Federation President on an operation to attempt to rescue Kirk, which is why I say that there were clearly non-hostile relations with the RSE at the time, as you would have made sure the Ambassador cleared out before holding such a briefing if they were considered hostile.
On Sela and the wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey ball that is her origin.
In canon, we do not know the circumstances of the destruction of Enterprise-C aside from that it was the Romulans who did it. For all we know, the Enterprise-C was engaged in a espionage mission into Romulan space and was destroyed for it. Or maybe the Romulans were having a bad week and snuck into Federation space for some scalps. Either could be true, or it could have been Iconians pretending to be Romulans to try and start a war between the Feds and Roms... take your pick. That said, it was not destroyed but at Narendra III, the Khitomer Massacre happened two years later according to Memory Alpha.
That said, in the case of STO, we DO know the circumstances, as they are laid out in the novel "Vulcan's Heart", which is one of the novels that seems to heavily inform STO's portrayal of the Romulans. The Enterprise-C was destroyed trying to prevent a rogue Romulan Praetor from starting a war with the Klingons to distract the citizens of the Star Empire from internal issues. While the Enterprise-C was destroyed, and the attack carried out, said Praetor was deposed and executed for his crimes, the war never started because popular Romulan support was AGAINST starting said war and even the SENATE was against it.
Likewise it was not the Romulans who wanted to destroy Earth, it was Shinzon, who was considered a rogue even by the militaristic Romulans who initially supported him. It seemed that the Romulan Senate at the time was quite happy with the status quo with the Federation (which was that of an ALLIANCE) and some hard-line military personnel were against it... likely wondering what peace would look like and how they could justify themselves in a time when they were at peace with the two largest superpowers they normally would have used to justify their status (huh... never realized before there were echoes of Star Trek VI in Nemesis...). To claim that those hardliners were representative of the Romulans, you would ALSO have to claim that Cartwright and Chang were representative of the Federation and Klingon Empires more than Kirk and Gorkon... and considering that in order for Dontara and Shinzon to carry out their plan they had to assassinate the entire Senate of the RSE same ONE to push through their ideals... that to me indicates their hardline views were in a minority within the Star Empire.
The relationship dance between the Federation/Klingons/Romulans is pretty complicated. The Romulans and Klingons seemed to be allies and then enemies in rapid succession in the same period. Bear in mind, countries can have major shifts in policy and alliances in merely 50 years, and we actually have a good 200 years of history between the Federation/Romulans/Klingons to account for, we cannot say that "this point in time is how they always are" because that timescale is simply TO LARGE. In the same period of time, to use human geoppolitics as an example, the United States and Great Britian went from colonial, to hostile independent countries, to friendly trading partners, to allies. The US and Russia went from allies (18th/19th Century/WW1) to hostile (USSR), to allies (WW2), to Cold War, to neutral (post USSR) to... whatever it is right now.
Likewise we see major shifting depending on the politics of the time. Between the Federation and Romulans their relations started as hostile (Earth/Romulan War) to non-existent (Founding of the Federation), to hostile (TOS), to neutral/cooperative (TOS Movies), to non-existent (TOS-TNG Interregnum), to Cold War (TNG), to neutral/cooperative (Early DS9) to Allies (Dominion War) to friendly (Post-Nemesis).
So, we have 150 years total of non-involvement (Earth/Romulan War - "Balance of Terror", 100 years; Tomad Incident - "The Neutral Zone", 50 years, going by the dates on Memory Alpha). Assuming a date of around 2160 for the Founding of the Federation, to the events of Nemesis in 2387, that's 227 years of political history between the Federation and RSE. A majority of that was spent in isolation from the Federation, with one incident of hostile contact (Enterprise-C) and one incident of friendly contact (Voy: "Eye of a Needle") that we know of in the Interregnum period. The only time where the Romulans were a fully hostile as a power was in the 2360s, as during the TOS era they were quite open (for Romulans) with the Federation, partaking in the Nimbus III attempt, signing multiple treaties with the Federation and being involved in the political games that were dominated by the Federation and Klingon Empire. (It should be noted, that in this same period there were multiple conflicts between the Klingons and Romulans, so its not that the Romulans were adverse to fighting, they just didn't fight with the Federation.)
So... why should the 7 years of open hostility portrayed in TNG be the norm for the Romulans? In DS9 they were clearly cooperative with the Federation (seriously people, they trusted the Federation with one of their Cloaking Devices, they trusted them enough to let them operate it without a Romulan overseer). Yes they did (or tried to do) some underhanded things to gain a foothold in the region, they also did underhanded things to try and prevent the entire war... likewise the Federation did underhanded things to the Romulans ALL THE TIME too. The Federation and Romulans used each other, committed acts of espionage and operations to keep up with each other all the time, why? Because that's what real nation-states do, even when they're not hostile (when they're not hostile, they just PRETEND they don't spy on each other, they still do it... as we all know from certain recent real life information leaks (*cough*Snowden*cough*)).
I will not say the Romulans and Federation were at a Cold War state EXCEPT for those 7 years between "The Neutral Zone" and "The Search". After the events of "The Search" the Romulans were more interested in stopping the Dominion threat and clearly were deescalating with the Federation (otherwise, they would never have allowed one of their cloaking devices to get into the Defiant). Did they still try and push their own self interest? Yes. So did the Federation. One side tried to set up a permanent military outpost in Bajor (while the other side already had one), and the other fabricated evidence to draw the other into the bloodiest conflict in the Quadrant's history and assassinated government officials to keep them involved... yeah... and the Romulans were "bad guys" in DS9.
Post Dominion War we have no evidence that the alliance fell apart until Shizon, and in fact, the events of Nemesis seem to indicate the exact opposite, that the Dominion War had greatly thawed relations to the point where the Romulans where a minority of hardliners rebelled and staged a coup specifically to try and return to the earlier Cold War status (but even they thought planetary genocide was a bridge to far.
Good thing they went with those awesome new aliens for Insurrection instead of the Romulans, they would have made for godawful antagonists, unlike those amazing ones we *did* get (end sarcasm)
I'm not saying Insurrection was a good film. I don't even think the people who made Insurrection are going to say that.
It does give us a good insight into what the actual people behind Star Trek thought about the Romulans, though. Which is honestly not much.
The real reason why we couldn't have a playable Star Empire in the game was because Cryptic analyzed the number of Klingon players compared to the Federation and decided that 'bad guy' factions just don't sell well enough to warrant two of them in game.
Well, that's simply not true. The Sith Empire is very popular in SWTOR, and just about everyone I know who's played WoW were in the Horde.
The real problem with the Klingons was . . . well, if you were here at launch, you know what the real problems with the Klingons was.
A more likely explination is that Cryptic just found it too hard to write compellingly, just like the people who made TNG and DS9.
You bring up the Cardassians, and that's true, they did get the development. There were about six episodes of DS9 where you got to see Cardassians and Vorta and Jem'hadar on their own, with no contact with Starfleet.
The thing is, as much time as they spent with Weyoun and Dukat, they never really tried to portray the Cardassian Union or the Dominion as protagonists. They gave Weyoun and Dukat and Damar some nice characterization, and they had the Dominion honor it's treaty with Bajor and keep Dukat from bringin' back the bad old days . . . but that's about it. Everything else was mostly those two or three people not being complete monsters all the time.
That's pretty much what they did with the Romulans: make two or three people repeatable to show that they'e not all bad, because that would be racist and this show is trying to be progressive (except when it comes to women, then it's catsuits for everyone!).
That would be a terribly difficult thing to pull off in an MMO, especially one without a morality system. Especially when you're supposed to be representing an entire faction in your storyline.
And power fantasy....really?
Yes, really. The Republic has things happening behind the scenes, and the player character is not at the center of every little thing that happens. I actually like that about them; whereas literally everything in the Federation is about your ship accomplishing everything.
Overcoming impossible odds for the sake of others can be a power fantasy, but it's a lot less shallow than just being CHAMPION OF THE MASTER RACE IN A GIANT WARBIRD THAT EATS HEROES WHILE YOU SMIRK AT YOUR OWN SUPERIORITY all the time, and that's the sum total of what Romulans have left when you remove everything about them that went to the Republic.
It's hard to make people want to stick with that long-term. You'd have to pretty much reinvent the Romulans to do it . . . which they did. And it worked, except for people who imagine they're secret Feds because they don't kick babies, or who get hung up on the word "Empire".
Mary Sue
This is one of those things that nerds use to sound smarter than they are, but that really doesn't mean anything, specifically. There are about 800 contradicting definitions of it, and the entire concept can be better boiled down as "awful characterization".
I'm not saying the Romulan Republic storyline is perfect at all. It definitely needs more shades of gray, and it needs more fleshing out. We need to know what the political structure is, how it functions day-to-day, what role Reunification plays, if any . . . what Reunification means, exactly.
But the story's still ongoing, and people are starting to pick up on some of this. Hopefully, we'll eventually reach a point where everyone can be happy in a Republic that represents a variety of viewpoints.
You would fight for a fraction which has more in common with the Star Wars Empire after Endor than with that in Old Republic - but could that not be appealing?
The thing is, 90% of that is also possible in the Republic. Making a new government avoids confusion: look at how confused people are over trying to tell the difference between the Empire and the Tal Shiar. Throwing the player's faction into that mess would make things even worse.
It ultimately seems to boil down to the word "Empire" for some people. I think is that's silly. Republics can be empires. Republics can be despotic. The Republic could absorb the Empire, or become a new Empire, or twenty different other things, and I would be fine with that.
STO isn't even the first post-TNG fiction to seperate the RSE. Even the novels separated it into the Romulan Star Empire, and the more amiable Romulan Imperial State.
The real reason we cant have the Romulan Star Empire is that youd never gain favor and prestige tagging epoop and calamari, and would probably have kept the Sword of the Raptor Star, verified its authenticity and given yourself a nice little boost to your claim of Praetor/Emperor/Empress :P /smartass
It ultimately seems to boil down to the word "Empire" for some people. I think is that's silly. Republics can be empires. Republics can be despotic. The Republic could absorb the Empire, or become a new Empire, or twenty different other things, and I would be fine with that.
I've often thought this as well. I suspect the reason Cryptic went with a new name was to help avoid confusing the factions when people talk about them in shorthand. I mean, look throughout these threads, we constantly have to differentiate between the Klingon Empire and the Romulan Star Empire, usually by calling them the Klingons (which in STO is not accurate anymore seeing how they've become multi-racial) and the Star Empire. If you want a name that continues to echo the origin of the Romulans with Rome, you're really only left with one choice: Republic.
Which then makes three quick and easy shortforms with no confusion: The Empire, The Republic and The Federation.
I'm not saying Insurrection was a good film. I don't even think the people who made Insurrection are going to say that.
It does give us a good insight into what the actual people behind Star Trek thought about the Romulans, though. Which is honestly not much.
It's a worthless example because their belief that Romulans as antagonists would make it a bad movie turned out to be false. And as much as I like Picard, lets keep in mind that we got that awful dune buggy chase scene in Nemesis thanks to Patrick Stewart's love of fast cars. The guys aren't infallible.
Well, that's simply not true. ... faction in your storyline.
Actually Cryptic is on record saying that it was at least one of the main reasons for not getting a RSE faction. Go through all the old audio interviews from when Legacy of Romulus was coming out, or right after. Their opinion was that they could make more money making a 'good guy' faction than a 'bad guy' one. While I wouldn't argue that 'bad guy' factions are more popular-more people typically play 'good aligned' in games that allow it, and 'evil options' tend to be rather underdeveloped and less rewarding comparatively. It does show that they were more concerned with monetization, not on trying to make an 'authentic' Romulan faction.
I do not buy that any game that has a 'bad' option requires a morality system. Games that let you do bad things were doing just fine before Biowere popularized the 'lightside/darkside' mechanic in rpgs.
Again, this is something that the KDF shows is completely unnecessary.
I do have to agree with you about jumpsuits and female characters though....all the T'Pol fanservice in Enterprise was one of the reasons why I stopped watching that show. And to think I though Seven was blatant and out of place.
Yes, really. The Republic ...on the word "Empire"..
It's a morality power fantasy- and Just as, if not more childish. Instead of being "CHAMPION OF THE MASTER RACE IN A GIANT WARBIRD THAT EATS HEROES WHILE YOU SMIRK AT YOUR OWN SUPERIORITY" as you put it, you get to be "CHAMPION OF THE RIGHTIOUS WHO SMITES ALL EVILDOERS" Sometimes you get to do 'bad' things, but it's always justified in some manner by way of "These people are horrible, this is completely justified". It's in there for people who want to have 'dark and edgy' characters without having to feel all squeamish about having the morality of their actions in questions.
This is one of those things ... variety of viewpoints.".
Calling people who don't agree with you dumb nerds never helps.. I think it's pretty darn obvious what I meant when I said that, 800 definitions be damned.
It reads like bad fanfiction because the writers were grasping at the straws of a soft-canon book series in order to make the round peg Romulans fit the square hole of the Republic.
FYI I ran the Romulan Republic through a 'Mary Sue' litmus test and it scored well into the highest category....and I thought I was being generous with all the ones I neglected to count.
Well, since I more or less new in the forum I know not every of the older thread, so excuse my failure. On the other hand I would say a lot of Romulans will not make much difference between HUMANS and FEDERATION (remember what Gorkons daughter said about the "homo sapiens club" - I guess that is the point of view of many rivals of the Federation), and such a war could bring long lasting hostility. Second I would say the situation during the Original Series was also tense, and fighting occour (with the old Enterprise - surely not the only ship).
Also I would say the Chinese and Americans rarely shoot each other in the last years - even during the Cold War it was rare. You could also argue that at times the situation was more like between North and South Korea, with Infiltration and smaller battles...
It could also be that the Ambassador in ST VI was present since Star Fleet sometimes seems a little bit generous in security issues (or whould you let do a boy like Wesley Chrusher doing work on a Space Ship, beside from dish-washing? )
I agree that there is no real deep hate between both sides, but I would say that a low but constant body count and a ongoing war in the shadows could be seen as more or less beeing the normality. Far from each sides waiting for a chance to destroy the other, but even not real normality or even friendly. But that may be a question of semantic.
shaanithegreen
You are right with what Republic COULD be (and ofter do). What I miss is that the Romulan Republic DO so - if they would be more like the Roman Republic or the Narn Republic in B 5, I would have much less problems. But for today they are playing a little bit to nice for my taste. Too much "freedom forever" - that, and the unrealistic picture of the bad-guy Romulans is not in balance in my eyes.The "bad" should be not so bad, the "good" not be so good. Perhaps D'Tan will changed over the time or be replaced, that would make it better, I think.
I could life with the split up of the Star Empire, but I think it would make more sense if the Republic whould be much more in the tradition of the Empire, claiming to be its heir (oder the real Empire) than speaking about something in many aspects very different.
kodachikuno
Well, being the one who could help to hold the Empire together and be an important king- or queen-maker would be enough, I think.
peregry
But could not the real history taken as an example how empires could live on? To be a "Aetius" or (if you choose fictional chars) "Bel Riose" (Foundation from Asimov) or "Thrawn/ Pellaeon" char in a struggeling Empire would be a interesting thing, I would say.
N
In canon, we do not know the circumstances of the destruction of Enterprise-C aside from that it was the Romulans who did it. For all we know, the Enterprise-C was engaged in a espionage mission into Romulan space and was destroyed for it. Or maybe the Romulans were having a bad week and snuck into Federation space for some scalps. Either could be true, or it could have been Iconians pretending to be Romulans to try and start a war between the Feds and Roms... take your pick. That said, it was not destroyed but at Narendra III, the Khitomer Massacre happened two years later according to Memory Alpha.
Except you are just wrong. We know exactly what happened. And Iconians intervention are not supposed to exist prior of STO, except for the Romulus/Remus destruction. Simply because it's an STO plot that was never part of anything trek before that. Sure, we had Iconians, but they were supposed to be extinct a long time ago, and we didn't even know if they were the bad or the good guys.
Before the alternate timeline, the one Picard changed by sending back the Enterprise C in time, they answered a distress call from the Narendra colony, a Klingon world. They were under attack by the Romulan, and the Enterprise came to help them.
This is why the Klingon were impressed, they gave their life, and fought to the end to protect one of their world.
With the alternate timeline, it's pretty much the same. The enterprise went back in time to save the Narendra colony, pretending to answer the distress call, and were captured by the Romulan. Everyone thought the ship and her crew was lost, the Klingons were impressed, etc etc...
In any case, the Romulan were not spying, or even in the Federation space at all. They were minding their own business with the Klingon, and the Enterprise violated the Prime Directive and went there to save the Klingons.
Ok, I was wrong, I mixed the Khitomer-massacre with the Narendra-incident, sorry. But that this was a maior conflict is true, with the loss of hundreds of lifes - and I guess that such incidents happened more than once, and sometimes surely the Romulan ship or even mor than one was lost... (although I must say, what happened at Narendra sound for me very much like pro-federation propaganda from the writers and a very bias portrait of the capabilities of starships - if there was no strong Klingon force there, since a Galaxy should be a easy prey for four warbirds if it are not only light units, which I do not believe in such an attack)
I do have to agree with you about jumpsuits and female characters though....all the T'Pol fanservice in Enterprise was one of the reasons why I stopped watching that show. And to think I though Seven was blatant and out of place.
And here I thought it was one of the only reasons TO watch that craptasm O.o Well that and Hoshi fanservice but poor girl has no TRIBBLE
Comments
What is obvious is that you were engaging in a thinly-veiled reference to me by your misapprehension of my position when you wrote:
"Or would such a infiltrator playing a 100 percent Republican, with a deep hate towards all what is TS, and towards the Imperial Past and all what was great and source of proud for so many Romulans, in that way showing that he could be trusted by the Republican leadership, minimizing any risk of a reunification, alienating many Romulans both inside and outside of the Republic? And by this way making it clear to the last Uhlan in the TS, that there could be never any reconciliation, that they must fight to their last breath or being executed by the Republicans."
The reason this is obvious is because these are precisely the flawed descriptions you have made several times of what I have advocated. The absence of my name does not suffice to excuse you when the words you used were the same words you have used in trying but failing to express what I have actually said.
I'm pretty sure I didn't say "Empires are bad," much less did I yell it. I may have teased at some point with a phrase like "Empire are bad, mkay?" (which is a sort of meme found often in Anglo satire, and which should not be taken at face value as any sort of serious absolute declaration). I am no fan of imperialism, that much is true, but that is not identical with an absolute "All S are P" statement such as you have alleged I made. I also never said that The Star Empire was rotten throughout its history. I have, on the contrary, said that it began to rot and that eventually the rotting and festering destroyed it from the inside. I have also stated repeatedly that the Star Empire as it was in TOS was considerably different from its later manifestations and that there was a time when it was possessed of honor.
And the Star Empire as it remains today does not have the resources or the numbers to ever rise again to dominance over the Romulan and Reman people, nor does it have sufficient appeal to those people that they would allow its crimes against them to be swept under the rug and vote to restore it.
I have, however, stated more than once in this forum that in time, the Republic will stop being a Republic and the Romulans and Remans will have a new empire, and that it might even be named "Shiar ih'Saeihr Rihan" again, but that it will not be the same entity as the late Shiar ih'Saeihr Rihan which is now but a rotting corpse being consumed by detritivores and carrion-eaters like the remnants of the High Command of the Tal'Shiar. And it's likely that eventually, that Empire will also begin to rot from the inside, because that tendency is a salient feature of empires. The reason I have predicted these things is because of the evidence of the histories of every species supporting the idea that socio-political entities experience a cyclical (or perhaps spiral) life, and that these changes appear to be inevitable, but there is hope that we might evolve beyond the repetitious cycle eventually (hence my allusion to the possibility of a spiral life instead, in which the society is not moving only in two dimensions, but rather, in three, and that the next time we come around to Point F [Empire] may be after we have ascended further toward an enlightened and educated society which will be able to avoid at least some of the excesses of the last time we were at Point F).
I don't think kodachikuno would like for you to associate him with me; we are not exactly allies, although he is more rational than some other opponents I have faced in these forum battles. He is not loyal to the New Republic, unless he has changed his tune since last we crossed pens.
The "scattered cells of the Tal'Shiar" refer to the organization in its current state, and "a gang of fascist thugs terrorizing the honest and law-abiding citizens of the Republic" refers to the Tal'Shiar as an organization as it has behaved in the past and would like to continue to behave. It does not refer to every member of the Tal'Shiar, and what with both Militia Intelligence and the Tal'Diann, the Tal'Shiar as an organization would be unnecessary by virtue of redundancy. Do not confuse the singular use of "Tal'Shiar" (referring to the organization itself) with the collective use of "Tal'Shiar" (referring to those who are part of the organization). The organization has no place in a Republic; those who have been part of it might, but as I said in my previous post in reply to catoblepas, history cautions us to not be overly eager to forgive or give the benefit of the doubt to these persons.
It's also disingenuous to focus on the final phrase of what I said while conveniently ignoring that I also said:
"The forces of the Empire have had ample opportunity to change sides, and the door is still open to any who be sincere."
(emphasis added)
Toodles.
There are four Imperial classes in SWTOR. Two of them are Sith, the elite of the Empire who can literally do whatever they want, as long as they don't step on the toes of their superiors. There's no real equivalent to space wizard samurai in Romulan culture. One is an independent contractor who isn't part of the Imperial structure, and who could care less about their ideals (just their credits). Might be interesting to see the RSE from an outsider's perspective, but that's not really what people want.
One is a member of a Tal Shiar organization . . . which basically exists because the rest of the Empire is so dysfunctional that it requires a secret organization just to clean up after it's incredibly stupid, rage-tripping leaders. As loyal as everyone in your group is, and as much as they legitimately believe in what they think the Empire is all about, it quickly becomes apparent that the Empire exists solely to benefit the Sith. Normal people like you are tools, to be used and discarded, as you eventually are used and discarded. In the end, you have to leave the Empire, and go rogue. You're now fighting for a nation of psychopaths, one you just proved doesn't care about you, and for it's ideals that you have just saw were always incredibly shallow lies designed to dupe you. You're basically the Empire's battered wife.
While that's an interesting story (probably the best one in the Empire), it could be boiled down to an brief essay on why the Empire was a bad idea in the first place. I might be able to enjoy that sort of thing, I wonder if that's really what the people asking for an Star Empire faction want.
TNG Romulans as they were in TNG are such one-dimensional, shallow antagonists that I simply cannot imagine them as protagonists. I can imagine it going down two ways.
The first is that some major changes happen to make flesh them out. Maybe you liberate Dontara, and try to put her back on the throne, and have a civil war with the Romulan Imperial State . . . but then, you've just recreated what we have now, without the word "republic" or 5000 page posts about who's fault the Sundering was.
Otherwise, I see them trying to let you be Hakeev, riding around in a big Borgified ship, chewing the scenery. I'm not sure what the point of that would be. We already have a faction that's an aggressive, sneaky alien empire with cloaking devices and birds of prey, and they are far better developed. There's really no point in making a faction for people who want to play a Klingon with a cleaner ship interior and less relatability (and a worse haircut).
I'm not saying that being a K-Mart brand Gul Dukat wouldn't be fun for a mission or two (that's probably why we have an entire Tal Shiar infiltration arc), but I don't really see the writers sticking with it for long, for the same reasons most writers never touch that sort of thing: it ultimately boils down to a very simple and very shallow power fantasy. Once that wears off, there is very little drama and nothing for an audience to connect to.
Ultimately, what's most interesting about villains is their downfalls. I would play the downfall of the Empire from the inside, most definitely. However, I think that's the only real story that exists for the Empire at this point.
I think that ultimately the problem with the TNG Romulans, and a major cause of why the Romulans cause division like we see here, is that they never really had a recurring character we could get a more sympathetic picture of them with. Like I said waaaaaaaaay back in this thread, we wouldn't exactly see the TNG Klingons in a very good light if we didn't have Worf around, would we? Much of what we'd be left with is Klingon politics, which...doesn't exactly portray a lot of Klingons as honorable individuals, to say the least. I think Worf served an important purpose in providing another perspective on the Klingons, as opposed to, say, that of the House of Duras we saw so much.
The Romulans did not have that. There were more sympathetic characters among them, of course, but they were always one-offs, as opposed to recurring characters like Tomalak and Sela.
Kind of a shame, that. Think of the internet arguments we could have avoided! :P
Again, I think it needs saying that I don't put much stock in the soft canon-at-best portrayals you are drawing from. They rather severely contradict the description of events in the Time of Awakening as shown in the shows, which has been rather consistent with itself-a global nuclear war of ideology. As is, I have no reason to believe they are any more canon than the description of Romulans from the Star Trek: The Next Generation Role Playing Game, for example. Likewise I don't think there's any sort of obligation to include ships or materials from the various trek games-as much as I'd like a Winged Defender class or a QeylIS BetleH class, or as much as I like the storyline of the Klingon Academy game I mentioned earlier.
My position is and has been that we need more 'Hard canon' depictions of Romulans.
Your tendancy to cherry pick from the shows is noted. The large majority of Romulan portrayals as 'bad guys' is not indicative of the majority, but the handful of 'good guy' Romulans somehow are.
Well you'll have to refresh my mmemory, because you still haven't provided that link, and I distinctly remember you trotting out the whole 'anyone who doesn't like the republic is an insignificant minority and should be ignored'(paraphrase) argument on several occasions.
Almost everything about the Romulans seems influenced by the military. Their government is military, their intelligence service(s) have their own personal fleets, they have a massive armed forces besides being supposedly isolationist, and have been involved in several wars with the other alpha quadrant powers. Even their scientists wear military uniforms. It's quite fair to use the term 'militarized' in relation to the RSE.
Even Klingon nannies are trained in the arts of war. One of them killed a Klingon assassin in TNG. Their entire culture revolves around the warrior lifestyle.
These aren't Humans we are talking about here. IMO Romulan culture has a completely different set of ideals and cultural obligations going by the shows. A people used to killing infants with birth defects, numerous wars, and spying by the intelligence services are likely to be a bit more 'hardened' than the federation.
I elaborated my position on your constant name dropping of your fan site in a followup post, as much as you might try to strawman that. I may dislike the 'advertising for recruits' aspect involved, but that wasn't what I was specifically criticizing, whatever your paranoid assertions are.
If you really have no problem with Tal Shiar reintegration, then that begs the question on why you have been arguing against it so vehemently for so many posts. I suspect that it has something to do with your distaste for allowing those with a more TNG-Romulan set of ideals and behavior into the fold.
Romulans in ENT were rather close to the TNG-onwards portrayals. One could just as easily argue that it was the TOS Romulans that were aberrant.
As long as they aren't planning a coup, the TNG-era paradigm shouldn't be blacklisted in a supposedly free society. And if the 'nice' Romulans really are the majority, then they shouldn't have anything to fear in an elected government.
The only difference between Paramilitary and Military is official recognition as military by the government. There's no reason to think that the Tal Shiar lacks this in STO, considering they absorbed all the branches of the Star Empire's armed forces. Even if that were not the case, they would be the de-facto military of the RSE in STO.
This is your opinion. I could say much the same of you. My impression is that you constantly shift goalposts to your own ends and split hairs over irrelevant minutiae like the demographic breakdown of those who left Vuclan or whether or not the Tal Shiar is a military or paramilitary force in STO for posts at end to avoid addressing the issues being discussed directly and endless backpeddling and reinvention of your stances.
Also, my stance remains that as much as I dislike the Romulans from the Rihannsu novels and Romulan Republic, and how awful an idea I think it was to retcon them into existence into a game that until then had followed the TNG-style of depicting Romulans. I'd rather have TNG-style Romulan portrayals added to the Republic-and am not requesting and do not expect them to remove the Republic and plug the RSE into place where they were.
Bringing the RSE remnants into the fold under the Republic is something that needs to be done in order to tie up the loose plot threads that is the Romulan civil war. And it would be the perfect opportunity to inject some more TNG-era Romulan mindsets and behavior into the Republic. Best of both worlds Republic/Rihannsu fans get their Romulans, and fans of the TNG-style Romulans get their sneakier, nastier Romulans.
That being said...I enjoy these little scraps of RP in our posts.
And yet I sense a lack of impending Tal'Diann boots kicking down the door to my estate on New Romulus. We have been enjoying no small amount of patronage from sympathetic members of the echelons of the republic, and have secured more than adequate enough funding and documents granting us broad powers in the pursuit of our agendas, not counting of course-the 'unofficial' influence we have through our agents in Starfleet, the KDF, and the various branches of the government and through the usual 'insurance' gathered on various members of those organizations. Our present and future position as the preeminent intelligence agency in matters both civilian and military in regards to the Republic is quite secure.
Your organization was quite inconvenient to undermine to the point where we can openly challenge the authority of the Tal'Diann if and where we wish to. Clearly a worthy enough opponent. In the tradition of Tomalak, I'm sure a suitably comfortable estate will be found for you in the event of your inevitable exile when Tal'diann becomes obsolete.
"And that's the way it is." to quote Journilist Walter Cronkite.
No ridiculous bluring of in character and out of character posts for the sake of showboating ones supposed ideology to state this fact in this topic.
[/SIGPIC]
I'd love it if the devs remastered the Romulan faction episodes so we can choose to side with the Empire, but that isn't the way things are right now.
I grew up watching the Romulan Empire on TOS and TNG/DS9, so I would prefer to join forces with the Empire rather than the rebel scum that is the Republic, but there's no point in going on about that.
Don't believe the lies in this forum. I am NOT an ARC user. I play STO on Steam or not at all.
Hopefully future material will give the option to act more in line with those Romulans if the player chooses to do so.
We likely will never get a playable RSE faction, but I think the Republic could stand to get a few more veins of the empire running through it.
And do what, exactly? What is this compelling story we're all apparently missing out on?
I mean, yes, the SWTOR example above shows it can be done, but only two of the four stories offered were more than shallow power fantasies.
Maybe you like that sort of thing, more power to you . . . but I can already tell you how it turns out. I can literally recite the entire story right here.
First, you get a new enemy faction that's even more evil than you to fight, but a lot more low-key. This takes up most of your time early on. Maybe it's something like pirates or slavers or terrorists like the Maquis.
Occasionally, you get to fight the good guys, I guess the Federation or Klingons in this case. STO would probably let you fight them for real, unlike say, Klingon Academy, where all the Federation stuff was a training exercise. You might get to cause some damage to them, but it will never be brought up in their own storylines, so who cares?
When you do, you get a few platitudes about how they're the real villains, because they're "corrupt" and don't stand by their high-minded values (whereas the Empire is steadfast in standing beside their incredibly impractical and stupid values).
Ultimately, there will be some bland intrigue and predictable betrayals, and from then on you're fighting your own faction. Because this is how "bad guy" stories always go. Everyone will nod along with this incredibly predictable twist, because Romulans, amirite? Ultimately, you will be the one who comes out on top, and will prove the true champion of all those values that you really shouldn't think too hard about (and not just because the Tal Shiar forbids you from thinking too hard about it on pain of death).
Now, even though this does work in SWTOR to an extent, there's a lot of other things there to make it more palpable that we just can't do. There's no light/dark side to the Star Trek universe. They can't do party member interactions, because . . . well, look at how much you obviously care for Tovan. I can only imagine how you'd feel if you had a chance to "comfort" him over how far Charva has fallen. It's not really practical to have multiple storylines for each faction like it is with TOR, so you don't get other perspectives on the RSE to the extent that people would want (people still say the Tal Shiar is black and white in this game, even though Charva seems to have been written in purely to show that they aren't).
What it boils down to is, as much as fans love the Romulans, they seem to be absolute hell to write about. Look at what Patrick Stewart and Michael Piller had to say about them, during the making of Insurrection. Look at the novels, which split them into a "good" and "evil" faction just like STO does.
You kind of have to do something like that. You just can't do that much with the Romulan Empire. They are villains who's initial appeal is their similarity to Vulcans and (less in-universe than in the writing) to humanity. In TNG, they seem to have existed only so they didn't have to invent new villains-of-the-week all the time. They don't stand up on their own.
Good thing they went with those awesome new aliens for Insurrection instead of the Romulans, they would have made for godawful antagonists, unlike those amazing ones we *did* get (end sarcasm)
Writing Romulan antagonists is easy-it's not that much different than writing Cardassian antagonists. As someone brought up before (might have even been you, I don't recall) For some reason although Romulans were quite popular with fans, the directors and writers etc hated Romulans, even as they devoted more and more screentime to their replacements, the Cardassians. (who turned out to also be quite popular-imagine that).
Klingon Academy and other Trek games that let you play as the 'bad guy' prove that there's a lot of mileage that can be gotten out of 'bad guy' factions. IMO all the "problems" you think playing 'bad' in a game invites have been proven false across a myriad of games, not just Trek. In fact, the Romulans, along with other 'bad guy' factions such as the Klingons, and more rarely the Cardassians have been staples of Trek games for ages now.
The real reason why we couldn't have a playable Star Empire in the game was because Cryptic analyzed the number of Klingon players compared to the Federation and decided that 'bad guy' factions just don't sell well enough to warrant two of them in game. This is why they reinvented them as the more kid-friendly Republic. It's also probably why they decided to reign in the nastier aspects of the KDF and ended the war. (now whether or not the lower player numbers were the result of a vicious cycle of less content meaning less players meaning less content....that's another debate)
And power fantasy....really? One could argue that the Republic storyline is a power fantasy much more easily with all the things the player and the republic get to do in the relative blink of an eye.- all while actively hammering the player with how good and pure the Republic is and how despicable and unredeemable the Star Empire is....the whole faction borders on 'Sue' territory in so many ways.
Here I have a different opinion. I liked actually General Chang much more than Worf, anyway that he was a hard-core imperialist and involved in a coup. I think Chang was a better representive for the Klingon military elite than the (mentally) "half-Klingon" Worf...
shaanithegreen
You are right there are no sith-like in the Star Empire, but high-ranking military with some backing of the TS would have a similiar independent role - they could act more or less freely as long as they did not really cross with someone much, much higher in rank. And that, I guess, could also said about captains of other species, since even a Klingon captain could not do what he want (or he become an outlaw like the Duras-sisters).
And the Empire for Romulans must not be exactly the same as it was in NG - if they include the Shinzon-coup and even the destruction of Romulos etc., than it would be more a Empire on the brink of destruction. You would fight for a fraction which has more in common with the Star Wars Empire after Endor than with that in Old Republic - but could that not be appealing? Sometimes the Empire was at its best when the chances of survival were bad, when they rallied behind people like Thrawn and his second-in-command. A Empire with charismatic and desperate military leaders and political elites, united in their struggle for survival, their proud of the past and vision for the future - but also sometimes fighting over the right way and who should lead. That would mean a story of inner struggle (to keep the Empire united) and outside warfare against all the vultures who like to prey on an obvious easy target. A story of brutal military campaigns, intrigues and power struggle, alliances with unlikely partners etc. The fight for every system to remain in the Empire, covert and open strikes against rival Empires etc. I guess there would be quiet several people who would have like that. The Republic is a bit too nice for such a feeling, with making peace with the Feds, the Klingons and the Remans, crying "Freedom" out loudly when the cry "unity" and "power" seems much more important. A good example are the Epoh. Not as such, but that the one scientist claim that several Romulans see the Epoh as symbol for their live - well, that is in my eyes not very appealing and sound even VERY pitty for people who once proudly claimed they had walked under the wings of the raptor.
catoblepasbeta and astro2244
Perhaps we should in future mark in-play and out-play sections like in that way
The Empire will live forever
(which is character-spoken) and
I disagree with that description, because of...
By the way, catoblepasbeta, the way you explain the situation of now make a lot of sense to me. Sad as it is...
Protogoth
"I'm pretty sure I didn't say "Empires are bad," much less did I yell it. I may have teased at some point with a phrase like "Empire are bad, mkay?" (which is a sort of meme found often in Anglo satire, and which should not be taken at face value as any sort of serious absolute declaration). I am no fan of imperialism, that much is true, but that is not identical with an absolute "All S are P" statement such as you have alleged I made. I also never said that The Star Empire was rotten throughout its history. I have, on the contrary, said that it began to rot and that eventually the rotting and festering destroyed it from the inside. I have also stated repeatedly that the Star Empire as it was in TOS was considerably different from its later manifestations and that there was a time when it was possessed of honor."
Well, before you made such statements, you should look into your own words:
"The Star Empire, such of it as remains which is not the Tall'Shiar, does not want to unite with the Republic. To do so would be to stop being imperialists. What they -- and the Tal'Shiar -- want is to destroy the Republic and either slaughter or enslave all who have supported it. There can be no "greater good for the Romulan people" by inviting these persons to join the Republic. They would not settle for it; they wish to dominate, to subjugate, to enslave, to torture, to kill. That is what EMPIRES do."
What of the statement "that is what Empires do" - not "that is what Empires of these or that type do" (to dominate, to subjugate, to enslave, to torzure, to kill) is not a one-sided bias bashing of ALL Empires? Sorry, but at this point I can see nothing other than I described...;)
And about your claim that you are no friend with kodachikuno - that was not the sole point. You had claimed that NO ONE here had argued for such a thing like summary executions. And I proofed that this was not 100 percent correct.
meh I don't mind ya too much. A bit pompous and hypocritical and way too friggin wordy but one can hardly argue your grasp of the Romulan language or the little bits of lore you choose to accept.
And no, I still stand firmly on wanting the Republic and its incompetent, glory hounding, leaders dead.
Remember some of the story in STO is based on novels after nemesis and after Shinzons death the Tal shiar were attempting to gain dominance over the empire and The vast majority of hostile Romulan NPCs encountered in the game are affiliated with the Tal Shiar.
my point being is that the Tal shiar are doing ANYTHING to gain power and restore what they believe is Romulan power, its likely that most of the Romulan Military that hasn't been taken over by them is simply defending what power the Empire has left, or has defected to the Republic.
As fore the republic itself Da'tan said that while he wants unification that cant happen till all romulans are united together in the New Roumlas entrance video, and i doubt reunification means he wants Romulans to become vulcans again but for them to rejoin their long lost brothers but still have their passion and emotions that they left Vulcan to preserve in the first place.
I may not be explain it well but i think the Republic isn't a bunch of Space hippies (scanning plants over and over again isn't hippish, they are after all building on a once poisoned world and need to make sure they dont end up eating something or expose themselves to something that could cause a mass plague) the Republic is going back to what they were before the Empire became what it was a society where once vulcans could live free of Logic and explore their emotions.
"It appears we have lost our sex appeal, captain."- Tuvok
It should be noted that the status quo for the Star Empire and Federation was peaceful non-involvement. The Federation and Star Empire never fought a single war. They had a HANDFUL of skirmishes over the entire history of the Federation, most of which was the Star Empire testing the Federation, though the Federation caused a few Incidents themselves.
Further, the Federation clearly saw the Romulans as something close to an ally (or at least, a non-hostile power) in the middle 23rd century. High ranking Starfleet Admirals, military personnel and the Federation President had no problem about talking about a high level, highly secretive potential military operation in front of the Romulan Ambassador ("Star Trek VI") (An interesting aside, this period of time fits within the supposed reign of Ael post the Rihannsu series, who would have been very friendly with the Federation and likely would have taken a personal interest in the rescue of one Captain Kirk, and the inclusion of the Romulan Ambassador there could be a way of the Federation obliquely telling her "we're considering our options, you don't need to do anything, please don't star a war with the Klingons because of your friendship".). I find this situation also very interesting in that by the point of Star Trek VI, TNG was on the air and had established the "new" Romulans. STVI specifically used the old makeup and had a different relationship between the Federation and Star Empire than TNG did, indicating there was definitely a major shift between the periods. Further evidence of a more open and peaceful RSE in the mid 23rd is in... I hate citing this... Star Trek V, as they were involved with the failed effort on Nimbus.
So its perfectly normal for the Romulans to be as peace, even friendly with, the Federation. Sure they bicker over borders and sometimes shoot at each other, you can't let your guard down, but the Romulan's involvement with the Federation has always been very weird. They don't appear to want to conquer (aside, maybe from Vulcan, though how much backing Sela's plan had is... questionable), they keep them on their toes, they have even turned a blind eye towards treaty breaking by the Federation when they clearly could have made major cases out of it (DS9: "The Warrior's Way") and sometimes they do things that seem more like they're making a "hard decision" that the Federation can't (DS9: "Visionary").
Further, the Federation offered aid and respite after Hobus, though some Romulans were upset that they didn't "do enough", the fact is they did help.
It seems to me that the entire Federation/Romulan relationship is actually a good example of the old adage "Good fences make good neighbors.". Because the Neutral Zone was so firmly entrenched for both sides, all the conflict between them centered on infractions and disagreements about that area. Both sides expanded more or less away from that zone as to not antagonize the other, and so the Federation and Romulans did not conflict much due to the forceful separation of their Sphere's of Influence. When did they conflict? When their Spheres of Influence overlapped and they had different end goals. That does not make them enemies, merely two empires looking out for their own self interest.
Now, I will grant the urge to make peace with the Klingons is much harder to swallow given the long and bloody history between them, and the multiple recent invasions Klingons had staged per the STO timeline (it's one of the reasons I play a Fed!Rom). However, simple realpolitick forces them to make nice. At the time of their decision to play the balance, the Romulans cannot simply side with the Federation. Mol'Rihan in to close to the Klingon border, and militarily they're to weak. While the Third (or fourth? I'm not sure) Federation-Klingon War was more or less a stalemate between the Fedrats and Klinks, the Romulans were a soft target, and the Klingons could make easy headway into them if they'd only sided with the Federation. So they had to grit their teeth and play nice with them and the Federation.
I think the real problem is that its hard to write about TNG style Romulans who were merely "antagonists" and such a police state that it is hard to make them anything but antagonists rather than protagonists. There's been many novels written about the Romulans before the current novels split them into two groups. The Rihannsu series being the first (which was HUGELY popular with the fans to the point of the petitioning that it be made canon, while Roddenberry absolutely HATED it to the point of trying to get the "Star Trek" label removed from the novels). Vulcan's Heart and the Vulcan's Soul trilogy also come to mind, both exploring the state of the Star Empire when it is more open (Vulcan's Heart taking place in the late 23rd Century and Vulcan's Soul taking place in the Time of Awakening/the Sundering and the immediate post Dominion War era, when the Romulans were officially the allies of the Federation).
Guess what kids. THE ROMULAN EMPIRE IS DEAD. Or damn near and in it's death throes.
There is no strength left there. Star Fleet has repeatedly trashed it's fleets, so has the Republic D'Tan has started. The Tal Shiar can only move in the shadows.
There is nothing left there except squabbling people trying to remember what real power was.
Piece of advice, let it die.
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That is a bad example I think. Real History is far different from that film. First, even the western Empire last some decades after the withdrawal from Britain, and it could still bite hard (ask the Huns and their allies who had to face the forces under Aetius command in France). Second, "Rome" lived on after the main forces left Britain for about 1.000 years - because the Eastern Empire still claimed (with certain right) to be the rightful heir of the Empire, or better BE ROME. And they destroyed indeed several of the Barbarian Groups who destroyed the Western Empire (Vandals, the Gothic Empire in Italy). So Rome as an idea and Empire lived long after the walls of the capital had fallen.
So the idea of Romulan-Roman Empire suits me very well - the Romulans will have their revenge...:D
peregry
But what is with the "war of the first contact" which is mentioned several times, in the very early days? Was he later erased from history? And did not Romulans and Federation clash over influence in the Klingon Empire, did not the Romulan Ambassador take part in the plans to undermine the peace between Klingons and Federation, and what is with the ship Sela's mother was on - destroyed at Khitomer? I am sure that was not the only examples. Peaceful non-involvement sounds in another way, I would say. And was not the Klingon-Romulan alliance very much directed against the Federation?
Strange definition for friendly...:D
Even single ships which were destroyed (what surely happened sometimes) mean every time the loss of dozen, hundreds or even more than 1.000 men and women or even more on one or even both sides. So I would say it was even a bit worse than the cat-and-mice-game between Soviet and US planes and Subs during the Cold War.
So I would say Cold War, which on some times was near to becoming hot (and was sometimes even fought direct) is the better description...
Again, much the same can be said about the Cardassians. The Cardassians, were widely popular *as* antagonists. All the spying, arrogance, the police state, the militarism-all of it added to their character and set them apart from the Federation and Klingons. If one can write good Cardassian characters and stories, than Romulans should not be a problem. In fact, Romulans seem to have been rather popular despite the fact they got sidelined by the Klingons and Cardassians later on.
I do not think the Romulans were really anything "close to an ally" with the Federation. I point to the attempted invasion of Vulcan-twice(if you count ENT), the attempt to annex one of Bajor's moons during the dominion war, the assassination that was necessary to drag the Romulans into the Dominion war, the attempt to destroy all life on Earth in Nemesis, and the numerous acts of sabotage and espionage throughout the time period, stretching back as far as ENT era. It's more of a cold war situation if anything, with more than a few instances where it became rather hot.
That film was horrible and had nothing to do with the historical account. Roman culture, ideals, and values far outlived the Roman pullout from England and elsewhere.
Also, it's evident you haven't been reading this thread. Nobody really expects the Star Empire to spring forth from the ground fully healed and ready to take on the KDF and Starfleet at this particular point in the narrative. (although pre-LOR, that was another thing)
Whether or not the Republic can reunite with the Imperial Remnants and/or gain a little spark of what made TNG/DS9 Romulans so memorable is what's at stake here.
The Empire for Honor and glory!! Ruthlessness and a little more freedom from the rules and regs of the feddies...
The Federation for structured advancement, Diplomacy (and perhaps a hope to defeat growing and looming threats to all Alpha and Beta quadrant species)
I use an example from a movie(never once saying it was history EVER) and I get taken completely out of context.
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The Federation and Romulans never fought war.
Canonically, the only war we know the Romulan Empire fought that's pertinent to this was specifically: The Earth/Romulan War, which was fought before the Federation existed as an entity.. I've often mentioned the Earth/Romulan War in many threads where I pointed out the same thing I just did (I neglected to mention it this time because I thought folks would remember that detail since I'd mentioned it many times before, my bad for assuming it was common knowledge).
Clashes over spheres of influence are not the same as open hostility. To use a real world example, the US and China are constantly conflicting over spheres of influence in the Pacific Rim, yet nobody calls them "hostile" or "enemies". Having conflicting interests does not inherently make two powers enemies. The Federation and Klingons often conflicted over methods and end goals, but since Khitomer they were at peace.
Of course, I mentioned all of this, noting that they've had minor skirmishes, most started by the Romulans.
As to Star Trek VI. We do not know the extent of the Romulan involvement in the joint Starfleet/KDF conspiracy to undermine what would become the Khitomer Accord. We know only that one of the conspirators was "The Romulan Ambassador". This could mean it was state sanctioned, though given how Romulans operated, there was likely no official sanction given to maintain plausible deniability in case things did not go to plan. He may have also been acting completely independently of the Senate with the RSE truly being in the dark about it too. It should also be noted that the Federation did not consider him a security risk for some reason, as he was present when Colonel West and one of Starfleet's Admirals briefed, the Federation President on an operation to attempt to rescue Kirk, which is why I say that there were clearly non-hostile relations with the RSE at the time, as you would have made sure the Ambassador cleared out before holding such a briefing if they were considered hostile.
On Sela and the wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey ball that is her origin.
In canon, we do not know the circumstances of the destruction of Enterprise-C aside from that it was the Romulans who did it. For all we know, the Enterprise-C was engaged in a espionage mission into Romulan space and was destroyed for it. Or maybe the Romulans were having a bad week and snuck into Federation space for some scalps. Either could be true, or it could have been Iconians pretending to be Romulans to try and start a war between the Feds and Roms... take your pick. That said, it was not destroyed but at Narendra III, the Khitomer Massacre happened two years later according to Memory Alpha.
That said, in the case of STO, we DO know the circumstances, as they are laid out in the novel "Vulcan's Heart", which is one of the novels that seems to heavily inform STO's portrayal of the Romulans. The Enterprise-C was destroyed trying to prevent a rogue Romulan Praetor from starting a war with the Klingons to distract the citizens of the Star Empire from internal issues. While the Enterprise-C was destroyed, and the attack carried out, said Praetor was deposed and executed for his crimes, the war never started because popular Romulan support was AGAINST starting said war and even the SENATE was against it.
Likewise it was not the Romulans who wanted to destroy Earth, it was Shinzon, who was considered a rogue even by the militaristic Romulans who initially supported him. It seemed that the Romulan Senate at the time was quite happy with the status quo with the Federation (which was that of an ALLIANCE) and some hard-line military personnel were against it... likely wondering what peace would look like and how they could justify themselves in a time when they were at peace with the two largest superpowers they normally would have used to justify their status (huh... never realized before there were echoes of Star Trek VI in Nemesis...). To claim that those hardliners were representative of the Romulans, you would ALSO have to claim that Cartwright and Chang were representative of the Federation and Klingon Empires more than Kirk and Gorkon... and considering that in order for Dontara and Shinzon to carry out their plan they had to assassinate the entire Senate of the RSE same ONE to push through their ideals... that to me indicates their hardline views were in a minority within the Star Empire.
The relationship dance between the Federation/Klingons/Romulans is pretty complicated. The Romulans and Klingons seemed to be allies and then enemies in rapid succession in the same period. Bear in mind, countries can have major shifts in policy and alliances in merely 50 years, and we actually have a good 200 years of history between the Federation/Romulans/Klingons to account for, we cannot say that "this point in time is how they always are" because that timescale is simply TO LARGE. In the same period of time, to use human geoppolitics as an example, the United States and Great Britian went from colonial, to hostile independent countries, to friendly trading partners, to allies. The US and Russia went from allies (18th/19th Century/WW1) to hostile (USSR), to allies (WW2), to Cold War, to neutral (post USSR) to... whatever it is right now.
Likewise we see major shifting depending on the politics of the time. Between the Federation and Romulans their relations started as hostile (Earth/Romulan War) to non-existent (Founding of the Federation), to hostile (TOS), to neutral/cooperative (TOS Movies), to non-existent (TOS-TNG Interregnum), to Cold War (TNG), to neutral/cooperative (Early DS9) to Allies (Dominion War) to friendly (Post-Nemesis).
So, we have 150 years total of non-involvement (Earth/Romulan War - "Balance of Terror", 100 years; Tomad Incident - "The Neutral Zone", 50 years, going by the dates on Memory Alpha). Assuming a date of around 2160 for the Founding of the Federation, to the events of Nemesis in 2387, that's 227 years of political history between the Federation and RSE. A majority of that was spent in isolation from the Federation, with one incident of hostile contact (Enterprise-C) and one incident of friendly contact (Voy: "Eye of a Needle") that we know of in the Interregnum period. The only time where the Romulans were a fully hostile as a power was in the 2360s, as during the TOS era they were quite open (for Romulans) with the Federation, partaking in the Nimbus III attempt, signing multiple treaties with the Federation and being involved in the political games that were dominated by the Federation and Klingon Empire. (It should be noted, that in this same period there were multiple conflicts between the Klingons and Romulans, so its not that the Romulans were adverse to fighting, they just didn't fight with the Federation.)
So... why should the 7 years of open hostility portrayed in TNG be the norm for the Romulans? In DS9 they were clearly cooperative with the Federation (seriously people, they trusted the Federation with one of their Cloaking Devices, they trusted them enough to let them operate it without a Romulan overseer). Yes they did (or tried to do) some underhanded things to gain a foothold in the region, they also did underhanded things to try and prevent the entire war... likewise the Federation did underhanded things to the Romulans ALL THE TIME too. The Federation and Romulans used each other, committed acts of espionage and operations to keep up with each other all the time, why? Because that's what real nation-states do, even when they're not hostile (when they're not hostile, they just PRETEND they don't spy on each other, they still do it... as we all know from certain recent real life information leaks (*cough*Snowden*cough*)).
I will not say the Romulans and Federation were at a Cold War state EXCEPT for those 7 years between "The Neutral Zone" and "The Search". After the events of "The Search" the Romulans were more interested in stopping the Dominion threat and clearly were deescalating with the Federation (otherwise, they would never have allowed one of their cloaking devices to get into the Defiant). Did they still try and push their own self interest? Yes. So did the Federation. One side tried to set up a permanent military outpost in Bajor (while the other side already had one), and the other fabricated evidence to draw the other into the bloodiest conflict in the Quadrant's history and assassinated government officials to keep them involved... yeah... and the Romulans were "bad guys" in DS9.
Post Dominion War we have no evidence that the alliance fell apart until Shizon, and in fact, the events of Nemesis seem to indicate the exact opposite, that the Dominion War had greatly thawed relations to the point where the Romulans where a minority of hardliners rebelled and staged a coup specifically to try and return to the earlier Cold War status (but even they thought planetary genocide was a bridge to far.
I'm not saying Insurrection was a good film. I don't even think the people who made Insurrection are going to say that.
It does give us a good insight into what the actual people behind Star Trek thought about the Romulans, though. Which is honestly not much.
Well, that's simply not true. The Sith Empire is very popular in SWTOR, and just about everyone I know who's played WoW were in the Horde.
The real problem with the Klingons was . . . well, if you were here at launch, you know what the real problems with the Klingons was.
A more likely explination is that Cryptic just found it too hard to write compellingly, just like the people who made TNG and DS9.
You bring up the Cardassians, and that's true, they did get the development. There were about six episodes of DS9 where you got to see Cardassians and Vorta and Jem'hadar on their own, with no contact with Starfleet.
The thing is, as much time as they spent with Weyoun and Dukat, they never really tried to portray the Cardassian Union or the Dominion as protagonists. They gave Weyoun and Dukat and Damar some nice characterization, and they had the Dominion honor it's treaty with Bajor and keep Dukat from bringin' back the bad old days . . . but that's about it. Everything else was mostly those two or three people not being complete monsters all the time.
That's pretty much what they did with the Romulans: make two or three people repeatable to show that they'e not all bad, because that would be racist and this show is trying to be progressive (except when it comes to women, then it's catsuits for everyone!).
That would be a terribly difficult thing to pull off in an MMO, especially one without a morality system. Especially when you're supposed to be representing an entire faction in your storyline.
Yes, really. The Republic has things happening behind the scenes, and the player character is not at the center of every little thing that happens. I actually like that about them; whereas literally everything in the Federation is about your ship accomplishing everything.
Overcoming impossible odds for the sake of others can be a power fantasy, but it's a lot less shallow than just being CHAMPION OF THE MASTER RACE IN A GIANT WARBIRD THAT EATS HEROES WHILE YOU SMIRK AT YOUR OWN SUPERIORITY all the time, and that's the sum total of what Romulans have left when you remove everything about them that went to the Republic.
It's hard to make people want to stick with that long-term. You'd have to pretty much reinvent the Romulans to do it . . . which they did. And it worked, except for people who imagine they're secret Feds because they don't kick babies, or who get hung up on the word "Empire".
This is one of those things that nerds use to sound smarter than they are, but that really doesn't mean anything, specifically. There are about 800 contradicting definitions of it, and the entire concept can be better boiled down as "awful characterization".
I'm not saying the Romulan Republic storyline is perfect at all. It definitely needs more shades of gray, and it needs more fleshing out. We need to know what the political structure is, how it functions day-to-day, what role Reunification plays, if any . . . what Reunification means, exactly.
But the story's still ongoing, and people are starting to pick up on some of this. Hopefully, we'll eventually reach a point where everyone can be happy in a Republic that represents a variety of viewpoints.
The thing is, 90% of that is also possible in the Republic. Making a new government avoids confusion: look at how confused people are over trying to tell the difference between the Empire and the Tal Shiar. Throwing the player's faction into that mess would make things even worse.
It ultimately seems to boil down to the word "Empire" for some people. I think is that's silly. Republics can be empires. Republics can be despotic. The Republic could absorb the Empire, or become a new Empire, or twenty different other things, and I would be fine with that.
STO isn't even the first post-TNG fiction to seperate the RSE. Even the novels separated it into the Romulan Star Empire, and the more amiable Romulan Imperial State.
Now everyone shut up and have an ale.
I've often thought this as well. I suspect the reason Cryptic went with a new name was to help avoid confusing the factions when people talk about them in shorthand. I mean, look throughout these threads, we constantly have to differentiate between the Klingon Empire and the Romulan Star Empire, usually by calling them the Klingons (which in STO is not accurate anymore seeing how they've become multi-racial) and the Star Empire. If you want a name that continues to echo the origin of the Romulans with Rome, you're really only left with one choice: Republic.
Which then makes three quick and easy shortforms with no confusion: The Empire, The Republic and The Federation.
It's a worthless example because their belief that Romulans as antagonists would make it a bad movie turned out to be false. And as much as I like Picard, lets keep in mind that we got that awful dune buggy chase scene in Nemesis thanks to Patrick Stewart's love of fast cars. The guys aren't infallible.
Actually Cryptic is on record saying that it was at least one of the main reasons for not getting a RSE faction. Go through all the old audio interviews from when Legacy of Romulus was coming out, or right after. Their opinion was that they could make more money making a 'good guy' faction than a 'bad guy' one. While I wouldn't argue that 'bad guy' factions are more popular-more people typically play 'good aligned' in games that allow it, and 'evil options' tend to be rather underdeveloped and less rewarding comparatively. It does show that they were more concerned with monetization, not on trying to make an 'authentic' Romulan faction.
I do not buy that any game that has a 'bad' option requires a morality system. Games that let you do bad things were doing just fine before Biowere popularized the 'lightside/darkside' mechanic in rpgs.
Again, this is something that the KDF shows is completely unnecessary.
I do have to agree with you about jumpsuits and female characters though....all the T'Pol fanservice in Enterprise was one of the reasons why I stopped watching that show. And to think I though Seven was blatant and out of place.
It's a morality power fantasy- and Just as, if not more childish. Instead of being "CHAMPION OF THE MASTER RACE IN A GIANT WARBIRD THAT EATS HEROES WHILE YOU SMIRK AT YOUR OWN SUPERIORITY" as you put it, you get to be "CHAMPION OF THE RIGHTIOUS WHO SMITES ALL EVILDOERS" Sometimes you get to do 'bad' things, but it's always justified in some manner by way of "These people are horrible, this is completely justified". It's in there for people who want to have 'dark and edgy' characters without having to feel all squeamish about having the morality of their actions in questions.
Calling people who don't agree with you dumb nerds never helps.. I think it's pretty darn obvious what I meant when I said that, 800 definitions be damned.
It reads like bad fanfiction because the writers were grasping at the straws of a soft-canon book series in order to make the round peg Romulans fit the square hole of the Republic.
FYI I ran the Romulan Republic through a 'Mary Sue' litmus test and it scored well into the highest category....and I thought I was being generous with all the ones I neglected to count.
Well, since I more or less new in the forum I know not every of the older thread, so excuse my failure. On the other hand I would say a lot of Romulans will not make much difference between HUMANS and FEDERATION (remember what Gorkons daughter said about the "homo sapiens club" - I guess that is the point of view of many rivals of the Federation), and such a war could bring long lasting hostility. Second I would say the situation during the Original Series was also tense, and fighting occour (with the old Enterprise - surely not the only ship).
Also I would say the Chinese and Americans rarely shoot each other in the last years - even during the Cold War it was rare. You could also argue that at times the situation was more like between North and South Korea, with Infiltration and smaller battles...
It could also be that the Ambassador in ST VI was present since Star Fleet sometimes seems a little bit generous in security issues (or whould you let do a boy like Wesley Chrusher doing work on a Space Ship, beside from dish-washing?
I agree that there is no real deep hate between both sides, but I would say that a low but constant body count and a ongoing war in the shadows could be seen as more or less beeing the normality. Far from each sides waiting for a chance to destroy the other, but even not real normality or even friendly. But that may be a question of semantic.
shaanithegreen
You are right with what Republic COULD be (and ofter do). What I miss is that the Romulan Republic DO so - if they would be more like the Roman Republic or the Narn Republic in B 5, I would have much less problems. But for today they are playing a little bit to nice for my taste. Too much "freedom forever" - that, and the unrealistic picture of the bad-guy Romulans is not in balance in my eyes.The "bad" should be not so bad, the "good" not be so good. Perhaps D'Tan will changed over the time or be replaced, that would make it better, I think.
I could life with the split up of the Star Empire, but I think it would make more sense if the Republic whould be much more in the tradition of the Empire, claiming to be its heir (oder the real Empire) than speaking about something in many aspects very different.
kodachikuno
Well, being the one who could help to hold the Empire together and be an important king- or queen-maker would be enough, I think.
peregry
But could not the real history taken as an example how empires could live on? To be a "Aetius" or (if you choose fictional chars) "Bel Riose" (Foundation from Asimov) or "Thrawn/ Pellaeon" char in a struggeling Empire would be a interesting thing, I would say.
Before the alternate timeline, the one Picard changed by sending back the Enterprise C in time, they answered a distress call from the Narendra colony, a Klingon world. They were under attack by the Romulan, and the Enterprise came to help them.
This is why the Klingon were impressed, they gave their life, and fought to the end to protect one of their world.
With the alternate timeline, it's pretty much the same. The enterprise went back in time to save the Narendra colony, pretending to answer the distress call, and were captured by the Romulan. Everyone thought the ship and her crew was lost, the Klingons were impressed, etc etc...
In any case, the Romulan were not spying, or even in the Federation space at all. They were minding their own business with the Klingon, and the Enterprise violated the Prime Directive and went there to save the Klingons.
Here is the link if you are interested.
And here I thought it was one of the only reasons TO watch that craptasm O.o Well that and Hoshi fanservice but poor girl has no TRIBBLE