Because...the Dominion went to war with us for encroaching in their space...we hardly won...I'm sure part of the treaty with the Dominion was leave us alone.
While I agree the Dominion had a right to defend their space from the Federation, the war was always going to happen, the founders tried to destabilise the entire quadrant and pit everyone against one another, even if they hadn't encroached on their space.
They are the ultimate control freaks, the Bajorian wormhole and the Alpha/beta quadrants represented a huge amount of uncontrollable elements so they started to act. Make no mistake the Dominion would of come through the wormhole sooner or later and it might of been a different story.
Some empathy-less fools do name their ships according to their lopsided immature nature. Thankfully, the game prevents the name of the single worst human being to ever walk our planet. His Evil policies still haunt us to this day. Him and his kind have no place in Star Trek while Anne Frank and her ideals do. Fact.
indeed, i wore my idic badge with pride when i attended my last star trek convention.
let infinite diversity in infinite combinations be our no 1 code of honor.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though. JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
Oh look we're getting grapple guns now, does that sound Like a tool an Intelligence analyst might use, or something used for covert military operations?
Looks more like these are in fact Filed Operatives
( Also, Batman time.... Nah nah nah nah nah nah nah nah Delta Quadrant )
These are the Voyages on the STO forum, the final frontier. Our continuing mission: to explore Pretentious Posts, to seek out new Overreactions and Misinformation , to boldly experience Cynicism like no man has before.......
Here is the what an intelligence officer would do aboard a star ship:
(Technically this is all the Operations Officer's job but its not like Star Trek to follow what the actual military does)
Starfleet is sending your ship to do a six month patrol of Beta Ursae. They want you out there to be able to stop bad things from happening and to 'wave the flag'/ conduct diplomatic duties with the various planets there.
The Intell officer would get a briefing from Starfleet Intell on friends and foes in the area as well as potential friends and foes about to pop up. He'd also get a pretty extensive mission packet on every planet in the sector.
A day before the ship is about to cross into Beta Ursae the Intell officer would brief the 'need to know' crew about the politics of Beta Ursae...the estimated distances to DS9 incase of emergency on any leg of the deployment, the political atmosphere of Bajor and Cardassia, Starfleet regs about the wormhole, planets to avoid...like the one planet where the new link is on....then the possible threat levels posed by True Way and The Marquis. Example: As of this briefing the True Way has 10 battle cruisers....and then a briefing on the commanders of each ship, capabilities and possible countermeasures.
Then once inside Beta Ursae the Intell officer would give a daily brief to the Captain about current events..."Marquis agents stole self stealing stem bolts from DS9...which may mean they are repairing their ships or gearing up for an attack"
Your pain runs deep.
Let us explore it... together. Each man hides a secret pain. It must be exposed and reckoned with. It must be dragged from the darkness and forced into the light. Share your pain. Share your pain with me... and gain strength from the sharing.
While I agree the Dominion had a right to defend their space from the Federation, the war was always going to happen, the founders tried to destabilise the entire quadrant and pit everyone against one another, even if they hadn't encroached on their space.
They are the ultimate control freaks, the Bajorian wormhole and the Alpha/beta quadrants represented a huge amount of uncontrollable elements so they started to act. Make no mistake the Dominion would of come through the wormhole sooner or later and it might of been a different story.
Yup, just look at how the founder acted towards the end. Trading away Cardassian space to entice the Breen. Ordering troops to fight to the last man, not to keep the borders of their own homelands but merely to cost the alliance so much that they couldn't threaten the Great Link. Retribution against the entire civilian population of Cardassia. Basically treating supposed "allies" of other races like pawns at every turn, their real and only primary concern being themselves.
They genuinely don't "get" why a race of people would balk at being utterly exterminated to protect a ruling class that has no problem treating them like fodder (which is why they have to use genetically engineered drug addicts to do most of their fighting).
Uh we already HAVE the First Officer position. It's on the Assignments tab. You can assign a Boff to be a First Officer, Head Medical, Head Ops, Chief of Security etc.
"A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. LLAP"
Oh look we're getting grapple guns now, does that sound Like a tool an Intelligence analyst might use, or something used for covert military operations?
I don't know. Does beaming into hostile territory to engage the enemy yourself sound like something a fleet admiral would do, or does it sound more like the job of a Starfleet Security enlisted man or a MACO? It's just the game playing along with the ridiculous situation it inherited from the show where The Main Characters Do Everything.
Guess what. He's a commissioned Starfleet Intelligence officer who went through Starfleet Academy or Officer Candidate School, the same as you did, and swore the exact same oath you did. And he is assigned to serve aboard your ship, which means he is subservient to you in the chain of command, then Starfleet Command, then the President, just like any other member of your crew. He does not report to some mad cackling black ops person or political compliance office, he reports to you. Starfleet Intelligence is not Section 31, nor is it the NSA, nor the CIA, nor the Central Committee of the Communist Party for that matter. It's the equivalent of the Office of Naval Intelligence, part and parcel of Starfleet's legitimate command structure.
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
I don't know. Does beaming into hostile territory to engage the enemy yourself sound like something a fleet admiral would do, or does it sound more like the job of a Starfleet Security enlisted man or a MACO? It's just the game playing along with the ridiculous situation it inherited from the show where The Main Characters Do Everything.
Guess what. He's a commissioned Starfleet Intelligence officer who went through Starfleet Academy or Officer Candidate School, the same as you did, and swore the exact same oath you did. And he is assigned to serve aboard your ship, which means he is subservient to you in the chain of command, then Starfleet Command, then the President, just like any other member of your crew. He does not report to some mad cackling black ops person or political compliance office. Starfleet Intelligence is not Section 31, nor is it the NSA, nor the CIA, nor the Central Committee of the Communist Party for that matter. It's the equivalent of the Office of Naval Intelligence, part and parcel of Starfleet's legitimate command structure.
just like all your medical officers are from Starfleet Medical
Your pain runs deep.
Let us explore it... together. Each man hides a secret pain. It must be exposed and reckoned with. It must be dragged from the darkness and forced into the light. Share your pain. Share your pain with me... and gain strength from the sharing.
just like all your medical officers are from Starfleet Medical
And all your science personnel are from Starfleet Science. Nail on the head. Thank you.
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Yup, just look at how the founder acted towards the end. Trading away Cardassian space to entice the Breen. Ordering troops to fight to the last man, not to keep the borders of their own homelands but merely to cost the alliance so much that they couldn't threaten the Great Link. Retribution against the entire civilian population of Cardassia. Basically treating supposed "allies" of other races like pawns at every turn, their real and only primary concern being themselves.
They genuinely don't "get" why a race of people would balk at being utterly exterminated to protect a ruling class that has no problem treating them like fodder (which is why they have to use genetically engineered drug addicts to do most of their fighting).
I think they get it, on some level, but after a long time of being harassed and persecuted by "solids", they stopped caring about that and build an empire to protect themselves.
The fact that they genetically engineered the Vorta and the Jem'Hadar instead of enslaving some pre-existing race may also may be out of distrust of "normal" solids, but it could also be because they didn't actually want to enslave others.
The reaction on Cardassia I think where more a sign of how "human" the Founders really were - the female Founder leading the forces got increasingly desperate and frustrated, sick from a disease created by Section 31. But there is probably also something very fundamental aspect of the Founder experience - Once again Solids failed and betrayed them (since Cardassians started turning against the Dominion around that time). And we certainly know that the Founders don't accept such betrayal easily (the race that was struck with a disease that got worse in the presence of medical equipment being the most prominent example).
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
Yes the same oaths and the same original career sourcing, And then we get into the classified Starfleet directives, the stuff nobody is told at no point until they reach a rank or position that they need to know. They aren;t exactly giving this info out in the recruiting office, theres things the Intelligence branch are going to deem need to know, and your captain, may not need to know
Memory alpha, for all its flaws is still my best source, so heres the entry " Starfleet Intelligence employed agents for their field operations, who were authorized to perform undercover investigations. Starfleet Intelligence agents (or "S.I. agents") reported to Division Heads, who oversaw their agents' missions."
Those division heads, are not going to be Ship Captains, the Chain of command for an S.I. agent, is not the same as regular personel.
Oh and lets not forget they are behind various cover ups like the Pegasus Mutiny and the Illegal Phase cloak. things which were both swept under the rug even after it was discovered by the Enterprise , shady stuff indeed
It might be an alternate timeline, but they were also repsonsible for purging any mention of 8472 from the starfleet database, again if you don;t need to know, they don't want you to know and they don;t want you giving it away in some kind of future version of the Freedom of information act
So if they are S.I agents then they are indeed reporting to an authority above and beyond your local ships Chain of command
On the other hand if they are indeed Intelligence officers such as the position held by Worf, then Its not an issue since they are going to be part of the local Chain of command anyway, The naming of the BOFF type suggests this, but the implications of the grapple and specialised ground gear and vessels implies a more active field agent role
These are the Voyages on the STO forum, the final frontier. Our continuing mission: to explore Pretentious Posts, to seek out new Overreactions and Misinformation , to boldly experience Cynicism like no man has before.......
In regardto the thread title:
I'll admit that when they announced a new bridge officer type with a 'dedicated type of station', I was persuaded they were talking about first officers.
The intel officers came as a surprise. One pointing toward a rather wierd penchant, actually. A lot that the intel officer does feels sciency.
Time will tell how that pans out. Though, this could've been a perfect way to introduce first officers and providing captains with alternate captain powers from other classes. That - I thought - had once been the plan.
I think they get it, on some level, but after a long time of being harassed and persecuted by "solids", they stopped caring about that and build an empire to protect themselves.
The fact that they genetically engineered the Vorta and the Jem'Hadar instead of enslaving some pre-existing race may also may be out of distrust of "normal" solids, but it could also be because they didn't actually want to enslave others.
The reaction on Cardassia I think where more a sign of how "human" the Founders really were - the female Founder leading the forces got increasingly desperate and frustrated, sick from a disease created by Section 31. But there is probably also something very fundamental aspect of the Founder experience - Once again Solids failed and betrayed them (since Cardassians started turning against the Dominion around that time). And we certainly know that the Founders don't accept such betrayal easily (the race that was struck with a disease that got worse in the presence of medical equipment being the most prominent example).
Funny thing about imperialists, they always insist their aggressive, expansionist, and blatantly ethnocentric ways should be overlooked because "insert melodramatic history of persecution here" followed by "and so we are doing this to bring 'stability and peace' to all, ensuring none must suffer like we did" while, of course, inflicting said suffering on others.
:9
In other words, the changelings discovered how to use propaganda.
These are the Voyages on the STO forum, the final frontier. Our continuing mission: to explore Pretentious Posts, to seek out new Overreactions and Misinformation , to boldly experience Cynicism like no man has before.......
Isn't that the function of the OPERATION MANAGE STATION? Here's a hint, Data sat there.
no, Ops serves as a conduit from the bridge to support departments not related to helm and tactical. the ops officer is primarily helm backup and science officer.
Just how dose that "political Officer" do his job? Crystal Ball? Tarot Cards? Palm Reading?
How they do it is immaterial... some one can kill someone with a hammer..... that does not mean all hammers are bad.
An intelligence officer is an officer who collects and processes "intelligence" (ie political information, movements, military elements, etc of a region).... Sure, a POLITICAL officer is using INTELLIGENCE to conduct his job..... however that does not make INTELLIGENCE bad.
I am primarily a KDF player in a cross faction fleet, this is for numerous reasons, one of which being that I find the Federation being so war happy jarring. Perfectly alright with it KDF side.
I do however maintain one Fed character for playing Faction specific stuff with fleet mates.
Until this thread I had no interest in the Fed T6 ships, but now I may grab one and dec my whole crew out in Section 31 uniforms.
From the perspective of the KDF and Romulans, I don't see an issue with intelligence officers.
I would like to see a liberated Borg intelligence Bridge Officer added to the store, as well as the other purchasable races, like Aenar, Catians, and Ferasans.
Thanks for the Advanced Light Cruiser, Allied Escort Bundles, Jem-Hadar Light Battlecruiser, and Mek'leth
New Content Wishlist
T6 updates for the Kamarag & Vor'Cha
Heavy Cruiser & a Movie Era Style AoY Utility Cruiser
DS9 was a destination. A hub for intergalactic traffic. It's not a starship.
let me make this clear. From a Section 31 standpoint, I am fine if someone wants a "Garrek" on their bridge. It won't be mine, and I happen to like the character Garrek. Cryptic has divided the game for me. It has limited my choice of customization. I will do my utmost to respect the desires of other players, even the ones with ship names like, B'ig Ju'cy Thighs.
I feel this will break the game. By refusing to allow me to upgrade my ship with my crew to T6, I have been betrayed. Feels like I already have a back stabbing int officer on my Bridge and I have lost my ship, my sense of progression. My desire to play.
People need to understand just how the whole concept of intelignce gathering works before they should be allowed to complain.
(aside from the fact, to the OP, First officer is a title, not a classification.)
There are multiple types of intelligence gathering.
Guess what is the American counterpart to the UK's MI5?
CIA? no, that's the counterpart to MI6, external intelligence?
NSA? no that's signals intelligence, they deal with intercepting communications.
Give up? The American counterpart to MI5 is the FBI!
The US government has over a dozen intelligence agencies, eight within the department of defense alone? And their jobs are not to keep the troops in line (which was the job of Commissar Putin in Red October), their jobs are to keep their troops alive by know what they enemy will do before he does it.
I'll give you an example. The "Get Smart" remake starting Steve Carell. In this version of story, Max Smart is an analyst. His job is to sat at his desk, and sift through information, the "chatter". He doesn't even get to be a field agent until everyone above him
At one point in the movie, it even saves his life when he recognizes the person trying to kill him. After revealing everything Max knows about him, two seconds later they are bonding over "American Top 40 with Ryan Seacrest".
This is what your Intel officer will be doing, on top of what ever other jobs you give them.
The OP Mentions Data and the operations officer. While Ops took over a lot of the sensors technobabble explinations, there are other details that are included in the intel job. For example, Uhrua and Hoshi Sato would sit and listen into radio communications from the planet of the week to gather information (example, "Bread and Circuses").
And Intel officer would simply be the one to take all this, put it together is a concise manner and tell his or her captain what they are getting themselves into. I say it again, His job is not to keep an eye on your rear, but to keep it attached to the rest of you.
Does this game include fancy field stuff for the them? Yes it does, but for the record YOU, captain, are no supposed to be going down there ether...
Everywhere I look, people are screaming about how bad Cryptic is.
What's my position?
That people should know what they're screaming about!
(paraphrased from "The Newsroom)
If I'm going into a First Contact scenerio (which supposedly most of the Delta Quadrant would be) then I want as much Intelligence given to me so I don't do a serious faux pas and start and intergalactic war that will take away resources and possible allies when my purpose is to do the exact opposite and gain allies and create peace.
Intelligence officers aren't bad. They're the people that are going to tell you that showing a culture the soles of your feet is an insult, or that giving someone the "peace sign" is the equivilent of giving someone the middle finger. They're the ones that are going to peace together the scraps of information we get from allies and advanced probes to let you know if you're dealing with a Matriarchy and that you shouldn't send down your male Captain if you plan on being taken seriously, and instead send your female First Officer.
Thing is they are clearly not just desk job Intel officers, Look at their availible pool of ground powers and Space abailities, and the "Intelligence Operative Gear" thats being announced by Cryptic , first one being Covert Infiltration eqquipment
These are field operatives, Closer to S.I. Agents from the Tv shows than the Intelligence Officer position held by Worf in DS9.
These are the Voyages on the STO forum, the final frontier. Our continuing mission: to explore Pretentious Posts, to seek out new Overreactions and Misinformation , to boldly experience Cynicism like no man has before.......
Thing is they are clearly not just desk job Intel officers, Look at their availible pool of ground powers and Space abailities, and the "Intelligence Operative Gear" thats being announced by Cryptic , first one being Covert Infiltration eqquipment
These are field operatives, Closer to S.I. Agents from the Tv shows than the Intelligence Officer position held by Worf in DS9.
...talking to players is like being a mall Santa. Everyone immediately wants to tell you all of the things they want, and you are absolutely powerless to deliver 99% of them.
Flag officers are desk job positions, but my Admirals never appear to have to do paperwork either, and gets to gallivant around in a spaceship, landing on strange worlds and blasting away new civilizations.
I hate to burst the OP's bubble, but you do not know what an intelligence officer is. Furthermore, since ship crews in Star Trek pretty much follow the same organization of US Navy ships, it would be safe to assume that every ship is supposed to have an intelligence officer. Intelligence on a ship falls under Operations.
Comments
While I agree the Dominion had a right to defend their space from the Federation, the war was always going to happen, the founders tried to destabilise the entire quadrant and pit everyone against one another, even if they hadn't encroached on their space.
They are the ultimate control freaks, the Bajorian wormhole and the Alpha/beta quadrants represented a huge amount of uncontrollable elements so they started to act. Make no mistake the Dominion would of come through the wormhole sooner or later and it might of been a different story.
indeed, i wore my idic badge with pride when i attended my last star trek convention.
let infinite diversity in infinite combinations be our no 1 code of honor.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
Brilliant
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though.
JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
Get the Forums Enhancement Extension!
http://www.arcgames.com/en/games/star-trek-online/news/detail/7003853
Looks more like these are in fact Filed Operatives
( Also, Batman time.... Nah nah nah nah nah nah nah nah Delta Quadrant )
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
(Technically this is all the Operations Officer's job but its not like Star Trek to follow what the actual military does)
Starfleet is sending your ship to do a six month patrol of Beta Ursae. They want you out there to be able to stop bad things from happening and to 'wave the flag'/ conduct diplomatic duties with the various planets there.
The Intell officer would get a briefing from Starfleet Intell on friends and foes in the area as well as potential friends and foes about to pop up. He'd also get a pretty extensive mission packet on every planet in the sector.
A day before the ship is about to cross into Beta Ursae the Intell officer would brief the 'need to know' crew about the politics of Beta Ursae...the estimated distances to DS9 incase of emergency on any leg of the deployment, the political atmosphere of Bajor and Cardassia, Starfleet regs about the wormhole, planets to avoid...like the one planet where the new link is on....then the possible threat levels posed by True Way and The Marquis. Example: As of this briefing the True Way has 10 battle cruisers....and then a briefing on the commanders of each ship, capabilities and possible countermeasures.
Then once inside Beta Ursae the Intell officer would give a daily brief to the Captain about current events..."Marquis agents stole self stealing stem bolts from DS9...which may mean they are repairing their ships or gearing up for an attack"
Let us explore it... together. Each man hides a secret pain. It must be exposed and reckoned with. It must be dragged from the darkness and forced into the light. Share your pain. Share your pain with me... and gain strength from the sharing.
Yup, just look at how the founder acted towards the end. Trading away Cardassian space to entice the Breen. Ordering troops to fight to the last man, not to keep the borders of their own homelands but merely to cost the alliance so much that they couldn't threaten the Great Link. Retribution against the entire civilian population of Cardassia. Basically treating supposed "allies" of other races like pawns at every turn, their real and only primary concern being themselves.
They genuinely don't "get" why a race of people would balk at being utterly exterminated to protect a ruling class that has no problem treating them like fodder (which is why they have to use genetically engineered drug addicts to do most of their fighting).
-Leonard Nimoy, RIP
Guess what. He's a commissioned Starfleet Intelligence officer who went through Starfleet Academy or Officer Candidate School, the same as you did, and swore the exact same oath you did. And he is assigned to serve aboard your ship, which means he is subservient to you in the chain of command, then Starfleet Command, then the President, just like any other member of your crew. He does not report to some mad cackling black ops person or political compliance office, he reports to you. Starfleet Intelligence is not Section 31, nor is it the NSA, nor the CIA, nor the Central Committee of the Communist Party for that matter. It's the equivalent of the Office of Naval Intelligence, part and parcel of Starfleet's legitimate command structure.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Check out https://unitedfederationofpla.net/s/
just like all your medical officers are from Starfleet Medical
Let us explore it... together. Each man hides a secret pain. It must be exposed and reckoned with. It must be dragged from the darkness and forced into the light. Share your pain. Share your pain with me... and gain strength from the sharing.
And all your science personnel are from Starfleet Science. Nail on the head. Thank you.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Check out https://unitedfederationofpla.net/s/
Execute your medical officers! They're clearly just waiting for the opportunity to harvest your organs! :eek:
I think they get it, on some level, but after a long time of being harassed and persecuted by "solids", they stopped caring about that and build an empire to protect themselves.
The fact that they genetically engineered the Vorta and the Jem'Hadar instead of enslaving some pre-existing race may also may be out of distrust of "normal" solids, but it could also be because they didn't actually want to enslave others.
The reaction on Cardassia I think where more a sign of how "human" the Founders really were - the female Founder leading the forces got increasingly desperate and frustrated, sick from a disease created by Section 31. But there is probably also something very fundamental aspect of the Founder experience - Once again Solids failed and betrayed them (since Cardassians started turning against the Dominion around that time). And we certainly know that the Founders don't accept such betrayal easily (the race that was struck with a disease that got worse in the presence of medical equipment being the most prominent example).
Memory alpha, for all its flaws is still my best source, so heres the entry " Starfleet Intelligence employed agents for their field operations, who were authorized to perform undercover investigations. Starfleet Intelligence agents (or "S.I. agents") reported to Division Heads, who oversaw their agents' missions."
Those division heads, are not going to be Ship Captains, the Chain of command for an S.I. agent, is not the same as regular personel.
Oh and lets not forget they are behind various cover ups like the Pegasus Mutiny and the Illegal Phase cloak. things which were both swept under the rug even after it was discovered by the Enterprise , shady stuff indeed
It might be an alternate timeline, but they were also repsonsible for purging any mention of 8472 from the starfleet database, again if you don;t need to know, they don't want you to know and they don;t want you giving it away in some kind of future version of the Freedom of information act
So if they are S.I agents then they are indeed reporting to an authority above and beyond your local ships Chain of command
On the other hand if they are indeed Intelligence officers such as the position held by Worf, then Its not an issue since they are going to be part of the local Chain of command anyway, The naming of the BOFF type suggests this, but the implications of the grapple and specialised ground gear and vessels implies a more active field agent role
I'll admit that when they announced a new bridge officer type with a 'dedicated type of station', I was persuaded they were talking about first officers.
The intel officers came as a surprise. One pointing toward a rather wierd penchant, actually. A lot that the intel officer does feels sciency.
Time will tell how that pans out. Though, this could've been a perfect way to introduce first officers and providing captains with alternate captain powers from other classes. That - I thought - had once been the plan.
Funny thing about imperialists, they always insist their aggressive, expansionist, and blatantly ethnocentric ways should be overlooked because "insert melodramatic history of persecution here" followed by "and so we are doing this to bring 'stability and peace' to all, ensuring none must suffer like we did" while, of course, inflicting said suffering on others.
:9
In other words, the changelings discovered how to use propaganda.
&#^=#&%. I knew I shouldn't have signed that donor card...
no, Ops serves as a conduit from the bridge to support departments not related to helm and tactical. the ops officer is primarily helm backup and science officer.
How they do it is immaterial... some one can kill someone with a hammer..... that does not mean all hammers are bad.
An intelligence officer is an officer who collects and processes "intelligence" (ie political information, movements, military elements, etc of a region).... Sure, a POLITICAL officer is using INTELLIGENCE to conduct his job..... however that does not make INTELLIGENCE bad.
Don't let the "ship's counselor" title fool you. As an empath, Deanna Troi's primary job was as an Intelligence Officer for Captain Picard.
It just happens that the job she had the most talent for was crashing starships.
I do however maintain one Fed character for playing Faction specific stuff with fleet mates.
Until this thread I had no interest in the Fed T6 ships, but now I may grab one and dec my whole crew out in Section 31 uniforms.
From the perspective of the KDF and Romulans, I don't see an issue with intelligence officers.
I would like to see a liberated Borg intelligence Bridge Officer added to the store, as well as the other purchasable races, like Aenar, Catians, and Ferasans.
Section 31 =/= Starfleet Intelligence.
(aside from the fact, to the OP, First officer is a title, not a classification.)
There are multiple types of intelligence gathering.
Guess what is the American counterpart to the UK's MI5?
CIA? no, that's the counterpart to MI6, external intelligence?
NSA? no that's signals intelligence, they deal with intercepting communications.
Give up? The American counterpart to MI5 is the FBI!
The US government has over a dozen intelligence agencies, eight within the department of defense alone? And their jobs are not to keep the troops in line (which was the job of Commissar Putin in Red October), their jobs are to keep their troops alive by know what they enemy will do before he does it.
I'll give you an example. The "Get Smart" remake starting Steve Carell. In this version of story, Max Smart is an analyst. His job is to sat at his desk, and sift through information, the "chatter". He doesn't even get to be a field agent until everyone above him
At one point in the movie, it even saves his life when he recognizes the person trying to kill him. After revealing everything Max knows about him, two seconds later they are bonding over "American Top 40 with Ryan Seacrest".
This is what your Intel officer will be doing, on top of what ever other jobs you give them.
The OP Mentions Data and the operations officer. While Ops took over a lot of the sensors technobabble explinations, there are other details that are included in the intel job. For example, Uhrua and Hoshi Sato would sit and listen into radio communications from the planet of the week to gather information (example, "Bread and Circuses").
And Intel officer would simply be the one to take all this, put it together is a concise manner and tell his or her captain what they are getting themselves into. I say it again, His job is not to keep an eye on your rear, but to keep it attached to the rest of you.
Does this game include fancy field stuff for the them? Yes it does, but for the record YOU, captain, are no supposed to be going down there ether...
What's my position?
That people should know what they're screaming about!
(paraphrased from "The Newsroom)
Intelligence officers aren't bad. They're the people that are going to tell you that showing a culture the soles of your feet is an insult, or that giving someone the "peace sign" is the equivilent of giving someone the middle finger. They're the ones that are going to peace together the scraps of information we get from allies and advanced probes to let you know if you're dealing with a Matriarchy and that you shouldn't send down your male Captain if you plan on being taken seriously, and instead send your female First Officer.
These are field operatives, Closer to S.I. Agents from the Tv shows than the Intelligence Officer position held by Worf in DS9.
They can be both.