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Delta Rising: Reanimate? (Y/N)--A Review Miniseries
gulberat
Member Posts: 5,505 Arc User
REVIEW SERIES NOW COMPLETE!!!!!!
Please read not just the posts if possible, but also the great discussion that has happened along the way. If you post, please keep it civil so we can keep the productive brainstorming coming!
Delta Rising: Reanimate? (Y/N)--A Review Miniseries
TABLE OF CONTENTS
(In a few cases, one post contains multiple section headers, and clicking the second section header will take you to the same post as the prior header. This is not an error. This table of contents also corrects for an instance of a post accidentally written out of order.)
INTRODUCTION
THE STORY
Disclaimer
Background
The Space Mission Arc
The Space Patrols
The Kobali Ground Arc
Character Development
Story Progression and Verdict
QUALITY ASSURANCE, MECHANICS, AND CUSTOMER RELATIONS
Testing and QA
Progression--The Mechanics Side, SpecGate/SPGate
The Golden Ratio: Time, Effort, and Money Versus Reward
The PvE Queues
The Upgrade System
Crypticonomics: Speculations on Market and Social Forces
Customer Relations and Crisis Management
THE VERDICT: CAN DELTA RISING BE REANIMATED--AND HOW?
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Original introduction post:
All right...so I finished "Takedown" last night and am now in a position to begin reviewing the entire Delta Rising expansion as a whole. I will be taking a comprehensive look at it from all aspects including story, progression, character and race development, art, mechanics and reward structure, quality assurance and testing, and of course the business and customer relations aspects of the whole thing. Due to how much I intend to tackle, this endeavor is likely to take some serious time to complete, but I intend to provide a look at the whole thing--the good, the bad, and the ugly.
My hope is that by showing how the whole thing fits together, and where it did not, it might provide some constructive comment and criticism. As you know, certain aspects have severely gotten on my nerves, but my goal nonetheless will be to approach each aspect as objectively as possible and acknowledge good where it exists, while still not hesitating to point out what is not working.
Hopefully I will have the first installment up tonight.
Please read not just the posts if possible, but also the great discussion that has happened along the way. If you post, please keep it civil so we can keep the productive brainstorming coming!
Delta Rising: Reanimate? (Y/N)--A Review Miniseries
TABLE OF CONTENTS
(In a few cases, one post contains multiple section headers, and clicking the second section header will take you to the same post as the prior header. This is not an error. This table of contents also corrects for an instance of a post accidentally written out of order.)
INTRODUCTION
THE STORY
Disclaimer
Background
The Space Mission Arc
The Space Patrols
The Kobali Ground Arc
Character Development
Story Progression and Verdict
QUALITY ASSURANCE, MECHANICS, AND CUSTOMER RELATIONS
Testing and QA
Progression--The Mechanics Side, SpecGate/SPGate
The Golden Ratio: Time, Effort, and Money Versus Reward
The PvE Queues
The Upgrade System
Crypticonomics: Speculations on Market and Social Forces
Customer Relations and Crisis Management
THE VERDICT: CAN DELTA RISING BE REANIMATED--AND HOW?
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Original introduction post:
All right...so I finished "Takedown" last night and am now in a position to begin reviewing the entire Delta Rising expansion as a whole. I will be taking a comprehensive look at it from all aspects including story, progression, character and race development, art, mechanics and reward structure, quality assurance and testing, and of course the business and customer relations aspects of the whole thing. Due to how much I intend to tackle, this endeavor is likely to take some serious time to complete, but I intend to provide a look at the whole thing--the good, the bad, and the ugly.
My hope is that by showing how the whole thing fits together, and where it did not, it might provide some constructive comment and criticism. As you know, certain aspects have severely gotten on my nerves, but my goal nonetheless will be to approach each aspect as objectively as possible and acknowledge good where it exists, while still not hesitating to point out what is not working.
Hopefully I will have the first installment up tonight.
Christian Gaming Community Fleets--Faith, Fun, and Fellowship! See the website and PM for more. :-)
Proudly F2P. Signature image by gulberat. Avatar image by balsavor.deviantart.com.
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Reanimate? (Y/N)
A review series by GulBerat
Introduction
Less than a month ago, PWE/Cryptic released what had been slated to be their most ambitious expansion to date. Following a player poll a few years ago in which players voted Voyager to be the series they most wanted to see material added from by a narrow margin against Deep Space Nine (more on the implications of that choice to come), the stated goals of Delta Rising were to both expand the story of the Star Trek: Online universe and also to raise the level cap and expand the range of what players are capable of doing in game. The star power was also nothing like Star Trek: Online had seen to this point, reuniting five of Voyager's cast members--Tim Russ, Ethan Phillips, Garrett Wang, Robert Picardo, and Jeri Ryan.
Anticipation among the playerbase had been tempered from the start based on reports coming out of a tightly-restricted Tribble preview--warning signs of bugs and in-game economics problems that if not addressed before launch would potentially damage the expansion and the overall success of the brand. What actually erupted not long after launch of the expansion was nothing short of a firestorm, made far worse by a series of critical missteps by Cryptic in the public relations and customer service departments. Many players have given up on alts, cut down play time, or outright been driven away from the game or alienated into ending their spending on it.
(In the interests of full disclosure, I have taken the latter route and after disposing of my remaining Zen accumulated before the DR launch, have indefinitely suspended all participation in the dilithium exchange both from a cash perspective and a dil-to-Zen perspective. However, I will still endeavor to deliver as comprehensive and fair of a review as possible.)
This review aims to unpack the successes and failures of PWE/Cryptic's second expansion and to answer the question--can Cryptic possibly succeed in "reanimating" Delta Rising and the game as a whole, or might the damage be irrevocably done?
In the next post, I will begin a comprehensive look at the story of Delta Rising. Spoilers ahead!
Christian Gaming Community Fleets--Faith, Fun, and Fellowship! See the website and PM for more. :-)
Proudly F2P. Signature image by gulberat. Avatar image by balsavor.deviantart.com.
Cheers! I look forward to your review.
Still, I will be reiterating that fact near the start of the second post.
Christian Gaming Community Fleets--Faith, Fun, and Fellowship! See the website and PM for more. :-)
Proudly F2P. Signature image by gulberat. Avatar image by balsavor.deviantart.com.
Disclaimer
I must preface my review of the story with the caveat that I played it through on a Federation toon. Due to severe prior personal dislike of the KDF storyline, and the prohibitive time and costs of maintaining alts, I will not be leveling any KDF toon beyond 50. Other reviewers have noted that the DR storyline can be problematic for a KDF player, and while this is not something that will impact me or that I actually care about for my own gaming experience, this does have to be acknowledged as a flaw even though in my opinion, it has been a long time in the works. "Surface Tension" has for all intents and purposes tied off the KDF arc and whether or not you agree with the choice, there is no longer even a real purpose for the KDF's existence even as a PvP faction since one would think the Federation and Klingons would want to avoid shredding their fragile treaty in pointless border skirmishes.
But, without actual experience on a KDF or KDF-Romulan toon, there is no further comment I can offer on this subject, so I will simply accept it as a matter of trust that for players who do care about the KDF, this is a significant additional demerit to the Delta Rising experience.
Background
As an experienced writer--non-published fanficcer, but with 20 years of experience under my belt nonetheless--the story, character, and world/race development are something I place a great deal of stock in when it comes to the quality of any work I sit down to enjoy. And I tend to spend a great deal of time analyzing why things work together the way they do...and what exactly is going wrong when they don't.
The selection of Voyager as the series for Cryptic to build on appears to have had drastic ramifications for the design and structure of the Delta Rising storyline--and quite possibly what Cryptic may have believed that players were voting for when Voyager won in that fateful poll. I did not vote for VOY but for DS9, in large part for the reasons ahead. Most Star Trek fans will be well aware that VOY is, with very few exceptions, a completely episodic show, not unlike The Next Generation--and given the show's premise, this was in the eyes of many fans, myself included, an absolutely damning decision on the part of Paramount.
What many fans perceived in VOY was a lack of basic continuity (HOW many torpedoes and shuttles did Voyager have again?), character development (Harry Kim the eternal ensign, and the complete lack of acknowledgment of the Maquis storyline other than a few throwaway episodes), and consistency (Janeway's command decisions, and if you want to see a really blatant example of characters randomly changing their moral stances and clearly having dialogue thrown in their mouths at random, check out "In the Flesh" where the only consistently coherent characters were the three UNDINE). There was none of the consistent arcs or storytelling seen in Deep Space Nine, and nothing even remotely close to what would later be seen in Ronald D. Moore's next endeavor, the Battlestar Galactica remake, which in my opinion shows what a "lost in distant space" scenario really ought to be like...even the infamous "survivor count" at the start of that show set the bar high as to the level of detail the writers endeavored to attend to as to the human and material resources the ragtag fleet had at its disposal at any given time.
Some of this seems to get a nod in Delta Rising itself, where it is noted that not all of the choices that Janeway made on her trip through the Delta Quadrant were right or even good choices. In fact, the thread that unites all of the disparate stories we have going on in Delta Rising (and the prior Undine arc, to boot) are two particularly egregious bad choices that Janeway made. One was siding with the Borg against the Undine without taking the time to observe, gather facts, or attempting to open relations with the Undine before throwing her lot in with the Collective. (True, it could have backfired and the Undine might not have been willing to listen, but at least we would know.) The other...we'll see about that one.
From a storyline perspective this goes a long way to explain why Admiral Janeway wasn't trusted to return and why Starfleet has placed Admiral Tuvok and your player-admiral in charge of the effort instead: Kathryn Janeway is likely persona non grata through a large portion of the Quadrant. While it may be that Katie Mulgrew was unable to join the DR team for Cryptic budgetary or other reasons, in my opinion Cryptic did well not to pursue that one too hard as there is a lot of in-universe sense behind that decision.
But were all of the impacts of VOY's storywriting style--and the inherent weaknesses of that style--handled well by Cryptic, or could this have been the source of some of the problems that DR encountered?
What impact might VOY's casual attitudes towards storyline continuity, character development, and consistency have had on Delta Rising?
As you'll see through the course of the story portion of this review, it may well explain almost everything about the character, race, and even player-admiral behaviors...really the entire storyline. Or storylines--plural.
The first thing to note about the Delta Rising storyline is that rather than a single, cohesive storyline, there are actually a minimum of three major threads the player is following at any given time--and for reasons I will be addressing later, three is the bare minimum that the player might happen to be experiencing.
As such, rather than attempting to thread all of them together in sequence, I will be addressing the Delta Rising storylines in three sections, which I will be calling: Space Mission Arc, Space Patrols, and the Kobali Ground Arc.
To be clear before I proceed--my assertion about the connection between VOY itself and the Delta Rising storyline is not to suggest that players who voted for VOY are somehow liable for anything that happened. I can well understand that some of those who voted that way may well have done so in hopes for a product that would take the original source material and release something that surpassed it in every way. However, I do wonder if Cryptic's development team saw the results of that poll and felt in any way that the sweeping story arcs of other parts of the STO storyline had been repudiated and that players were not looking for that type of content--and as a result all of the flaws of VOY itself ended up compounded by a very similar sort of decision-making at Cryptic.
And one more thing: as you'll see when I move through the storylines, I absolutely will be giving credit where credit is due. The storylines were in my opinion not a total loss and there are some very cool parts of them that I am going to be calling out--including something that I actually think I am going to be going strongly against the prevailing forum opinion by praising.
NEXT POST: Story--The Space Mission Arc...
Christian Gaming Community Fleets--Faith, Fun, and Fellowship! See the website and PM for more. :-)
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In the last year, I believe Cryptic has contacted John deLancie, Levar Burton, and Kate Mulgrew about appearing in the game.
I think the cast they assembled here was largely a group of friends and that Tim Russ probably had a hand in assembling them. Mulgrew, by most accounts I'm aware of, is part of a separate social clique and never cared for the Seven of Nine character (which isn't to say anything about Jeri Ryan), which was a divisive addition for the cast.
I would like to see Janeway in the game. I keep joking (but I'm not entirely joking) that I think Admiral Janeway should be introduced as head of Temporal Investigations. The character has the experience for it and her odd values/disposition seems to fit with what I'd expect if Starfleet got into proactive temporal ops. And there's a variety of reasons to think that probably is going on in the backdrop of the game.
There's also some setup for this. We've done quite a bit of time travel. A mission has what might be seen as a cliffhanger where we're told to expect scrutiny from Temporal Investigations.
Section 31 has a working time machine used to retrieve us in Night of the Comet. Taris was last seen using an Iconian portal to time travel to save Romulus. B'Vat was using time travel tech gifted to him by Temporal Cold War Guy. We've met 29th century types in-game and it's been periodically mused by devs that they may make Temporal Cold War Guy a character in the game. The time travel mission with Sisko is supposed to be up for getting remastered by Cryptic using audio from DS9 (which Cryptic apparently has rights to use). Oh, and Geko has ideas that involve the two Admiral T'Naes.
Janeway running TI has an "Oh, $#!&, the fox is running the hen house" quality to it. But that works well for the game. It explains why she is separate and it seems like a natural role for her, much moreso than imagining her in some kind of diplomatic or educational role at Starfleet. I kind of think she'd be a weak professor or diplomat but would be great at a post supervising and actively encouraging development and use of mad science approaches.
Heck, maybe toss in one or two of Bashir's misfits working with her. I think that's where she'd shine. A bunch of brutally unorthdox mad scientists tossing around strategic plans for temporal weapons or something. She could alternate between being group conscience and enabler, which is what that kind of work would call for in a leader, I think.
AVISO!
ACHTUNG!
AVERTISSEMENT!
If you proceed beyond this point, you are either affirming that you have played through all of Delta Rising, or that you have no problem with reading EXTENSIVE SPOILERS about ALL aspects of the expansion!!! I am not liable for anyone's failure to read this disclaimer.
For the following three sections, I am going to be mostly ignoring the level/story progression issues, and treating the three arcs as self-contained units according to the play experience one would have if they had had the opportunity to level solely on this material, or waited to enter DR until reaching Level 59 (the first level at which all DR missions are open to the player). What I am looking at here is story and plot as they would have been. I will also be ignoring bugs, QA, and customer relations issues for now; I am looking at this strictly from my perspective as a writer.
The Space Mission Arc
The first thing to note--out of everything that you see on the Episode tab for the Delta Quadrant, there are only eight true missions. These are the ones I will be addressing as the Space Mission Arc.
I don't know about anybody else, but my expectations were extremely high coming off of the absolute success of "Surface Tension"--a mission that built the Undine arc up to epic proportions, delivered incredible art, story, and combat, and absolutely knocked the ball out of the park (or ESD out of orbit!)
The first real mission that we play is "Mindscape"--the culmination of the Undine War arc, and also of the personal battle of wills between Tuvok and the Undine version of Dr. Eric Cooper (the Cooperdine, for short). You could also call this story Cooperception, because the writers absolutely nailed the trippy, otherworldly feel of the experience the player-admiral has with Tuvok in his battle against the Cooperdine.
The experience here is absolutely amazing as you wander through the world inside Tuvok's mind, fighting not just the enemies that the Cooperdine puts before you, but the figments of a battered psyche. The steps you have to take to get past that one door, if you actually read what that text says...all I can say is, if you are someone who remembers your dreams very well, have you ever tried to read in a dream? The writers nailed it there--that's exactly the kind of nonsense and contradiction from moment to moment that actually happens to a dreamer. Add that to the shifting scenery, shifting maps, and shifting, not-always-linear goals...they got it right. I happen to like these kinds of trippy plots (I similarly loved the Tal Shiar episode "Mind Games"...try that one with Radiohead's Kid A in the background for a really messed-up experience in a good way).
And having played a LOT of Undine material (I adore Undine Infiltration and Viscous Cycle), the space and ground combat in "Mindscape" really delivered...not to mention that Undine ship interior. (Ahh, to dream of that interior being added to the inside of my Dromias...
One criticism I saw about this episode, though, really got me thinking. Someone said that to them, after all that had gone on with the Undine/Cooperdine arc, it wrapped up extremely quickly, only to be brushed aside and never addressed again.
From a writer's perspective, I can see real validity to this point--but the fault in my mind has absolutely nothing to do with "Mindscape" as a self-contained episode. It is strictly a matter of how to place an extremely well-crafted episode, that unfortunately when I think about it, fell in the wrong season. Had it been released as a one-shot similarly to "Surface Tension," I think that instead of getting lost in everything else that was to come, "Mindscape" would have instead really been felt and appreciated by the players as the coup de grace on the entire Undine arc, and that with time to savor it and think about it, it would really feel like the epic ending to two massive arcs--one strategic and one intensely personal--that it was written and produced to be.
The choice not to release it that way is also something that I think had huge implications on Delta Rising as a whole--because it could well have been the saving grace Cryptic could have used to buy some much needed time. I will be addressing that much later in this review but I did want to throw that little tidbit out there now.
Unfortunately, I do not remember all of the subsequent episodes as well as I should...and some of the problem owes to the mixing of plotlines and broken progression. But I will recall what I can...
The next mission we come across is "Reunion"--which turns out to be a reunion between Tuvok and Neelix. I know that the Neelix character gets on a lot of people's nerves, but the thing is, Neelix is in my opinion deliberately made to be that way, and the frustration that I felt with him at being turned into Admiral Errand-Boy in such a blatant manner really felt like a great send-up to some of the other missions where we are running around doing things that aren't fitting for an admiral. Neelix's cheerfully enthusiastic insistence seems--and I kid you not--deliberately crafted to emphasize just that fact. We shouldn't be doing it...and I admit, I would've liked for Tuvok to take some potshots at Neelix and lampshade this STO trope even more. The back-and-forth between the two characters would have been just priceless.
I did enjoy thinking through the astrometrics puzzle too...the rest of the story is not that memorable to me, but at least it was a full mission.
So, "Revelations" brings us our first encounter with the Vaadwaur--and the shock of finding out very quickly that combat techniques I had honed well against the Borg and even the Undine were not going to work against this new enemy. And this is also the first encounter with the rather unlikeable Turei (though I admit, their bad encounter with Janeway does excuse some of their attitude). I almost find myself thinking they and the Voth deserve each other--the Turei for their attitude, and the Voth for their bigotry. (As a personal aside it would also have been hilarious to watch them try to figure out what to make of my Cardassian captain who is neither reptile nor mammal but a therapsid...
Next Space Arc Mission is "All That Glitters." So the Doctor is here to deal with a medical problem...oh man, I SO wanted an option to greet him with, "Please state the nature of the medical emergency," and see what kind of smart-alecky response I would get in return! Such an opportunity missed.
Another really sickening moment--but well written--was when the player-admiral is forced to choose between two sets of hostages and you are not given a miraculous save. I actually sat there and thought about which room I was going to go to (which I ended up choosing by listening to the location names and trying to figure which of them would be most likely to have total civilians as opposed to people with any kind of military experience). And the ones that we were told were going to die...really died. Good on Cryptic for no reset button there.
From that point, we're in total war with the Vaadwaur, and we get into a series of missions that is extremely memorable. First of these is "Capture the Flag," which has one of the most awesome "retake a ship" scenarios I have ever experienced. Not to mention the Liberated Borg guy and his scenarios were darkly amusing to me. The battle against the superpowered Vaadwaur in particular was really well done--both the battle itself and the Palpatine-style death in the singularity core! While I am not saying very much, this was a real standout mission and one I was able to really get caught up in the experience of. Good work!
But it got topped in a huge way--and that is really saying something--by the next mission, which is "The Dragon's Deceit." Here we go straight into the heart of Vaadwaur territory, but absolutely nothing about the gameplay of this mission is predictable or standard, to me, from the holographic approach to Kartellia that starts to go wrong (though there may have been too big of a dose of plot armor to excuse that one), to what happens when you get down on the ground. Ziplines? Rappelling? Whoa! That was really cool to watch. (Just one question, are the Vaadwaur not used to scanning regularly for alien lifesigns? Or am I wearing a jammer? There should be something...)
The other really awesome part was how they arrange the player-admiral's meeting with Eldex, the...well, good guy may not be the right term, but cooler-headed, more rational Vaadwaur. With the sick cruelty the Vaadwaur showed before, we needed a scene like this where, when our character was completely helpless and Eldex could have just finished the player right then and there and gloated over the dead body like we saw Gaul do to the Talaxian chef. Nothing like a little of the old ultraviolence, right? Well, letting Eldex show some mercy was after Gaul's display extremely critical to establish even a tiny modicum of trust with him because otherwise, there would be no reason whatsoever to give him any kind of opening.
Now, this is strictly a "personal headcanon" thing, but I played through this mission in a Cardassian toon (and I also realize the game could never recognize a Cardassian since those of us who play Cardassians must create them as aliens) and to me the similarities between Cardassians and Vaadwaur both in appearance and even to a degree in history is unmistakable. To me, both races--though unrelated and from opposite ends of the galaxy--are both therapsids and have both struggled with cruelty and totalitarianism. Of course, Eldex would not have known any of the historical aspect, but in my headcanon while it didn't make him any friend of Admiral Berat, I had this thought that seeing a being so much like a Vaadwaur physically yet also so clearly alien would have made him do a bit of a double-take. But that does speak to how well this mission was done, that I found my imagination engaged in that way.
The fight against the neural parasites...that was really fun and difficult, though I found myself a bit unsure as to whether the parasite biology made any real sense. Then again, there's no telling what kind of alien life cycle such a strange creature would have, so maybe that's not really such a big deal. Overall, very impressive mission and like the previous, one that I would gladly do again.
Some would say that the next mission on the episode list, "Alliances," is a true mission, but other than the fact that it does the warping from system to system for you, the truth is this one is a patrol mission. It's so close to the other patrols that I don't think it deserves credit as a rue mission; therefore I will be dealing with it as part of the Space Patrols bit in my next post.
So blah blah blah we have allies, and some of them less trustworthy than others...
On to the next true mission: "Revolution," and back to the Kartellia System. But to really shake things up and make it interesting, we get to fly a Vaadwaur ship! I really find myself wanting to rerun the mission just for that purpose, so I can really experiment with that ship. (Now could it be that this is an advertisement for a future lockbox ship?) The engagement with the Benthan ship was interesting from a character standpoint too, because it let us see that although Eldex was our ally, he wasn't exactly a friendly Federation clone--he still had that ruthlessness even though he generally had discipline and had his priorities straight in comparison to his brethren. Still not someone to give your total trust to.
So then we sneak our way into Kartellia and find another use for holoemitters--and my, my, is my toon looking smart in that greatcoat, although in a kind of creepy, slightly World War II-ish way that I fully expect was deliberate on the part of the devs (and fitting, considering everything else about the way these guys fight, the way their weapons work, their screwed-up leader, and so forth). Like the ship, I do wonder if that was an advertisement for future Lobi outfits...dat coat...if it weren't for going on a spending strike, I would be thinking very seriously about that thing.
And then we crash the Vaadwaur rally, and give them a little demonstration of what exactly has been going on with their people--except...what the heck? Was Gaul out of range of our device or what? Hold that thought...we'll be addressing that later. Now runnnnnn like heck and get out of Kartellia fast, in your nice shiny Vaadwaur frigate...
Now we reach the end of the arc--the payoff at Level 59: "Takedown." And speaking of epic missions--this one has got it, and is memorable in every way. From the very beginning we have something different: for the first time your rank as an admiral is truly acknowledged, and while Tuvok is advising you, he is going to defer to your strategic decisions. I found myself really getting into the admiralty experience, surprisingly enough, pulling out my phone to take notes during the briefing as to what all of the "allies" had to offer...or might present problems. And as we progress to the actual space battle, this really does work the way it should for a fleet admiral: the allied forces have already engaged before your ship arrives on the scene--and as the ship carrying the ranking flag officer, this is how it should actually be. I'd like to see some more playing with this sort of mechanic in the future for sure.
Some people have reported struggling with this mission on Normal, either because of the decision-making (generally solved by taking notes and then checking your first hunch with Tuvok right before you decide), or because of the multiple Heavy Artillery ships and Gaul's flagship. The thing is, a survivable build is going to be of more use to you than a min/max build, and I was set up for survivable crowd control already, and used to having to defend myself and not just blow my targets to hell before they can bat an eye. So in the end, I was able to get through all right on my Vesta. Where the most significant challenge was going to come was on the ground...
(Now, I apologize if this bit came from a different mission, but it was an example of a ground challenge that while it made me go through the whole book of curses, it was VERY well planned on the part of the devs: and that was that bit when I beamed down into a Vaadwaur hangar and started picking off soldiers one by one...got complacent...and got completely ganked by an Overseer that I hadn't thought to check for. I learned my lesson going into "Takedown" about hitting my map and checking each enemy to make sure there wasn't one of those bad boys in there. O_O )
The final battle on the ground against Gaul's forces--and then finally Gaul himself--has to be one of THE most intense things I have ever done in STO's ground combat. The spawn rate on the drones was absolutely unbelievable and if it had not been for training on the Kobali front (particularly the final mission there), I think I would have died in there a lot. As it was, I wasn't still for even a second.
And then the reveal about Gaul--he didn't have a parasite! This, from a story perspective, was a very interesting twist because just when we think only a creepy nonhumanoid creature could possibly be that callous and cruel, we find out it's a humanoid just like any other. Just like Dukat, or like any of the megalomaniacal murderers of Earth history, this guy is just that screwed up and horrible without any "help" whatsoever. Now, I would have liked to get a bit more of an idea as to how he got that messed up--because that is a serious level of messed-up. But I thought that was a really interesting twist though, especially because it explained what I had initially thought was an oversight/inconsistency on Cryptic's part in "Revolution," but was in fact a very deliberate clue.
The plot after Gaul was defeated did wrap up a bit fast...in addition to speaking to the Voyager crew, I would also have liked to have a final conversation with Eldex to get a bit more insight about how much, if any, the Vaadwaur are going to change as a result of all that has taken place or whether they are going to remain a threat.
Overall though...if you take the eight true story missions together, I think that these episodes were done very well. Which in a lot of ways makes many of the other things that happened with Delta Rising very unfortunate.
And don't forget as we move into the next part, as I suggested before, Cryptic had the opportunity to release "Mindscape" and buy time for more development to avoid the pitfall to come...
NEXT POST: The Space Patrols...
Christian Gaming Community Fleets--Faith, Fun, and Fellowship! See the website and PM for more. :-)
Proudly F2P. Signature image by gulberat. Avatar image by balsavor.deviantart.com.
To be honest, I could have done without Seven (who, per the Path to 2409, should have been going by the name Annika Hansen and shown greater character development), though I think Jeri Ryan is better than the character she played.
Hmmm...I dunno. Part of me also thought she could be in Section 31--but she'd need to be more competent for that.
I don't have a high opinion of Janeway to be honest, and I think she was better being left out. :-/
Christian Gaming Community Fleets--Faith, Fun, and Fellowship! See the website and PM for more. :-)
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Agreeing with everything you've said so far except Neelix (while he was annoying, I actually felt myself feeling sorry for him, given his species...an a really nasty part of me wanted to HELP Gaul and just get rid of those lazy, incompetent, good-for-nothing ignoramuses forever), but this post is such truth.
The final battle with Gual was perfectly challenging but not overwhelming. As it should be. Whne I got to the end of Dragons Deceit and saw the parasite I was giddy for the first time in a while in STO. Since TNG S1 those little buggars have been my favourite alien nemesis. I was so upset Paramount decided they were too dark and nixed any re-emergence of them.
Id be very interested in your take on the Kobali storyline which, to be honest, should intersect with the missions listed above as they, too, are part of the Delta Rising experience. Considering that, realistically, from start to finish Delta Rising should have been the equivalent to years (YEARS) of time passing before the conclusion, it would make sense that the two aspects would intertwine.
Id be VERY interested in your take at the final scene in the Kobali Temple.
Cheers
Edit: Neelix . I have actually found myself liking him MORE since DR. Definitely one of the most human characters and perfectly voiced by Ethan Phillips.
Then again, I always liked Neelix, I have a high tolerance for annoying, as long as someone has a good heart.
I liked Capture The Flag, also because it was the Romulan Republic Flagship. My initial playthrough was as a Romulan, so it mattered more to her as a character than it would have to your average Fed or KDF captain.
In Dragon's Deceit the holographic approach was very "Shuttle Tyderium" from Star Wars, even so far as a "Fly Casual" type remark from Eldex lampshading it. But that whole mission was good as well.
I never developed the sort of animus towards Neelix that many other people did...and I think part of that owes to the fact that whatever you think of him, he had the strength of personality for you to develop a strong opinion, compared to many of the Voyager characters, who were just cardboard. "Love to hate" is in my opinion a far superior reaction to "who was that, again?"
I actually feel the same way about STO's Tovan Khev and actually defend his existence (and even the fact that you can't dismiss him) unlike a lot of players. Khev is brash, a loudmouth, and undisciplined, but he is also a colonist and not career military, and his personality is strong enough that he can be that much of a lightning rod.
And for me, I was actually able in my headcanon to develop that personality and get hold of him in the Tailor to display how I thought he would really look and comport himself. My version went all the way from the generic-looking colonist to a bold, metrosexual guy who didn't care what you thought of him for dressing differently, being attentive to grooming, and DEFINITELY didn't give a flying frak about serving in a subordinate position to a Reman female and all the filthy, racist innuendo people hurled at him and Shalrak for his doing so. (And no, he was not sleeping with her. People certainly implied it, though.) Not the kind of guy who hides that he thinks different, acts different, and speaks differently, and "if you don't like it, well, then, you're just S.O.L., aren't you?" Except my version of him probably wouldn't use an abbreviation when he said that.
I think that in modern times we are far more prepared for something like that, considering what the cable channels are carrying these days where it's actually vogue to be dark, grey, or an outright evil unlikeable b*stard that we are supposed to accept as the 'gritty antihero because this is what LIFE IS LIKE,' and it is now trend-breaking to be good and show traditional character and morals.
The funny thing is the scene that creeped me out the most in the original episode was not Remmick getting gorily phasered to death. It was the part when we see the Remmick-host blankly, obediently accept that parasite crawling right into his mouth. EWW EWWW EWWW EWW EWWWWW!
These aliens were so creepy that they became the second species that I have little hesitation about using Gul Berat's Ophidian Cane on. (Which, by the way, he does NOT own in my fanfic due to the serious moral problems with such a weapon.) Due to having another toon who is a good-hearted Devidian (raised on Earth, given artificial means of sustenance), even though in-game I do use the thing sometimes, I really find myself feeling uncomfortable about it against most species...and that even includes the Undine, who we know to be thinking, feeling individuals, even if most of them are outright fascists. You can find an Undine who will listen to reason even if you are putting yourself in grave danger to do so. You cannot make an enslaved Borg drone listen to reason and death is to be favored above continued slavery, where liberation is impossible or too dangerous. Similarly, when these things have got a Vaadwaur host, especially with what we know about the torment they inflict upon the poor soul they've enslaved, death is similarly to be preferred and even a normally unthinkable weapon becomes a mercy.
Don't worry, you'll definitely be getting all of that as Section 3 of "The Story."
Totally agreed there. While Tim Russ' range is restricted by playing a Vulcan, he's always done extremely well in my opinion and still managed to make something come through for the player. ("Step Between the Stars," "Surface Tension," and "Mindscape" being the strongest.) But Ethan Phillips was by far and away the most dynamic voice actor STO has ever had, and I think Cryptic got the most out of their buck for hiring him. (Him and Tim Russ, for two totally different reasons.)
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I'm kind of the same way, and I would also rather deal with a "lightning rod personality" well written, than a "no personality" in a story.
I admit I didn't start thinking they were all going to die until Neelix offered the use of the asteroid base for the peace conference. But as soon as that happened I had a really horrible feeling.
[quote[I liked Capture The Flag, also because it was the Romulan Republic Flagship. My initial playthrough was as a Romulan, so it mattered more to her as a character than it would have to your average Fed or KDF captain.[/quote]
Definitely makes sense. Even playing a Cardassian, I could really appreciate the graphics. I am sure had I been playing my Romulan Republic toon (which I do not intend to level due to the intensity of the grind), it would have really meant something to my Reman. Especially since the Scimitar was originally of Reman make anyway.
It was a good thing it was the Llieset, though. If it had been the Bortas'qu, my help would have been grudging, to put it mildly. I would have so wanted to go, "Well, you're the Big Bad Warriors. YOU go throw yourselves at that Overseer and enjoy yourselves a good day to die because I don't care." That said, if it involved a cutscene with Captain Koren dying an embarrassing redshirt death, then it would've totally been worth it. Mwaaahahahaha...
I had to look that up, since I'm not quite enough of a Star Wars fan to catch all of the little references right away. But sometimes the Cryptic team does throw in some funny lampshading bits.
(My favorite is actually in Undine Infiltration, with the Voigt-Kampff test that you do on Vibo Laren. I laughed so hard when I saw that!)
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I mean the KDF is a retread of the federation just with some words changed when it could of been so much more.
You could of had the KDF dealing with the Kazon, the romulans dealing with intelligence gathering or better yet having them work specifically with the cooperative to do daring missions to disrupt the collective and recruit more drones to freedom.
So much potential for 3 very separate stories to have players actually have to play though EACH faction up to 60 to get a good story.
Sorry a huge opportunity was wasted here. And while I also like seeing the Voyager, where the hell is the ENTERPRISE? You'd think the federation flagship would be out here, or was she in the end?
I haven't gotten there and spoilers didn't bother me.
And the separate stories could of been done for all 3 factions but it's again a major thing wasted.
I mean getting to Nimbus(which should of been Rom arc alone, I hated going there as fed or KDF since it didn't make sense, could of had 1 mission so you can get the nimbus distress call for KDF and Fed).
Plus doing the Cardassian arc as the KDF was annoying as hell. Just using Stass instead of Kurland was just silly.
Again while the overall story is quite good, STO could of done a hell of a lot more.
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I did not see Enterprise, though. I do suppose that the Federation also has to consider the PR problems that would result from the flagship from getting blown up (kind of like why Gaul did not risk HIS flagship on the front lines until he had his back to the wall).
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The early missions are very fun for the KDF, then all of a sudden it's Federation retread the rest of the way once you hit Nimbus. It's a crying shame honestly.
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It REALLY stinks to hate a character because they're basically a plot droid. This is why I write Three the way she is; people can try to think of her as the Gritty Antihero who's still the Good Guy...then she makes it clear that she IS the gritty antihero, and she does absolutely horrible things with no remorse whatsoever. And she is NOT the Good Guy. Well said, have to agree here. I have to give props to Robert Picardo and Garret Wang, too.
When Wang gets a decent script, the man's on FIRE. And Robert Picardo...well, he was good on Trek, and a LOT better on SG-1. I love his voice, too.
Russ is a one-trick pony, sure, but a damn impressive pony.
Phillips...I've said it before and I'll say it again, Phillips is great but Neelix sucks. Huge waste of talent.
Nice to see Harry Kim FINALLY step into the light as his own man and captain of his own ship, not the eternal ensign that had no character to him.
I liked Captain Kim. Ensign Kim, that was just a travesty.
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Even worse if they are there to prop up a Mary Sue/Gary Stu or excuse any other character that doesn't deserve it.
(BTW, this is my Tovan Khev. He does not care what anyone says about being second to a Reman woman. She is his friend and commanding officer and he will serve proudly, dagnabbit! I was so proud to see him as I'd designed him in that cutscene where he totally loses his temper at Khitomer: http://s1300.photobucket.com/user/NerysGhemor/media/screenshot_2013-05-26-17-01-02_zps0a1ae464.jpg.html I'm normally not a fan of the Romulan Republic uniform, but you know what the difference between Tovan and any other Romulan is? He makes this look GOOD.)
I suspect with a different type of character we would've been able to see more breadth out of him. But as Tuvok he is able to make that role work.
Phillips' voice acting was so good that listening to it on headphones, it was like he was right there in the room, like the very best actors in a high-budget audio book or radio drama. He brings such life to Neelix--and utterly lifelike and conversational. I think there are a lot of voice actors who could take notes from what he did in STO, and that includes some other big names like Denise Crosby.
(Of STO's voiceovers, I think the ones I've liked the most have been the characters of Obisek and Dr. Cooper. Especially, with Cooper, once we saw what the man had been before the Undine took him, tortured him, and then dragged his reputation through the mud with the mockery they made of what had once been a resourceful and actually pretty brave man even though he had no ability to defend himself. Tovan Khev was pretty good too.)
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Ensign Kim was just sort of generically THERE for 7 seasons. Oh, my god...Chakotay was so totally this to Janeway...
I explicitly modeled some of Three's antics on Janeway, actually. The biggest psychological differences between the two is that Three has limits and openly admits that she's a monster, while Janeway has no demonstrated limits and acts like she's still a person. Not bad. I couldn't get over his nearly destroying the Republic for his ex bit myself, but he was fun enough other than that. Agreed, on both counts. Ethan Phillips is Bob Bailey-level good. And that's saying a LOT--if voice talent were money, Bob Bailey would be Bill Gates.
He is so WASTED on Neelix, it makes me want to cry...
Obisek I want to see assimilated just so he can self-liberate with some Line of Badass. Dude's like George Washington circa the battle of Trenton crossed with Jason Bourne crossed with Rambo. And he is AWESOME.
Plus they got the guy who does Ironhide in CO to play him, and that guy is GREAT.
Cooper...I've gotta say, UndineCooper was a fun villain, if a bit of a moustache-twirler...and I'm OK with that. I like how, as with Hakeev, Cooper pays big-time for his Big Speech of EEEEEVIL!!!!--Tuvok mind-hacking that Undine psi master? Best. Moment. EVER.
Plus it gave Tuvok another chance to be dangerously genre savvy.
Khev had his moments, but I get irate every time I think about his efforts for his ex almost destroyed the Republic.
What I hate about Khev, he tells me what to do ON MY OWN FRAKKING BRIDGE! :mad: Well till we find his sister then he mysteriously shuts up.
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This is an extremely difficult area to review--and the reason why that is really gets to what the main problem with the space patrol "missions" was: there were so, so many, and most of them came off as filler...in some cases because good seeds for greater things got buried in a sea of repetitive drudgery, and in other cases because the particular patrols were the repetitive drudgery that reinforced the nature of the grind that was unfortunately inflicted upon us by Cryptic with Delta Rising.
I know I mentioned before the connection between these missions and the worst of what Voyager was during its run, and I find myself wondering if the devs interpreted the vote for Voyager as a vote for accepting these things--that the playerbase didn't care. If that was at all in the thought process, it was definitely a mistake on their part.
These missions contributed in the worst possible way to compound the loss of continuity that players were already feeling due to the leveling problems--or more accurately, insufficient storyline content to level through to 60...well, in theory to make it to 60. They are legion and you just cannot remember the infinite number of kill-five-waves that you have to endure.
The funny thing is, some might characterize the Kobali Ground Arc in a similar manner due to the numerous missions, sub-missions, and open missions that are basically the ground equivalent of patrols, and the inability to progress through the story without interruption, but the Kobali Arc did not fall prey to that and instead became a highly memorable and extremely divisive lightning rod among players that, whatever you may think of it, deftly avoided the sin of not being remembered.
A few others, even if I do not remember the details, left me only with a sense of bitter distaste that as a Federation officer the way that my character was forced to act was completely contrary to what was right or even sensible--like being hit with "Divide et Impera" over and over and without even the outside possibility raised by one of the Foundry authors that your character was suffering the effects of Undine brainwashing and thus unable to object. There should have been in some cases, ways to succeed diplomatically without firing a shot (Cooperative vs. Octanti, Round 2, I'm looking at YOU) and still get a return in XP that would not be ripping off what little you get from actually getting into a million little shooting wars.
Except if we're talking about Vaadwaur. With few exceptions (Seriously? Making me sanction a Hirogen hunt? I hate the Vaadwaur but I draw the line at aiding and abetting in their dead and wounded ending up as some sicko's taxidermy project.), I have no problem just blowing them right the heck out of the sky.
And one of the ultimate examples of being forced to hold the idiot ball--and then being dragged in the patrol calculated to infuriate, bore, and make me feel I wasted my time...the Hodos system and that stupid fake and interminably long "qualification track." I HATE racing games. And I especially hated that bit.
Other patrols left me hating most of my "allies" in the Delta Quadrant, with two clear exceptions: the Benthans and the Cooperative. The Turei, Hazari, Hierarchy, Hirogen, and some of the Kazon all succeeded in making unbelievable asses out of themselves and making me feel like I am being forced to be a complete and total idiot for ever letting them into a position of any sort of trust.
This is how Janeway got into trouble and screwed up the Delta Quadrant in the first place, folks...
Because I am not going to try to recall all of the missions, what I am going to try to do first is describe the strongest impressions I had--some of these the seeds that I think should have been used to develop full-fledged missions. Many of these represent passed-over potential, and that to my mind is a very sad thing to see.
I think that we could have had somewhere between three to four missions based on seeds found in the patrols...and the one mission that could be excused by the players for remaining in the same format as presented to us is "Alliances." And had it been the only one, I would have been a lot less harsh on it and not hesitated to call it a true episode.
The good about it..."Alliances" has one mechanic that no other patrol mission had...and that is automatic warping from system to system. Seriously, it was a "Hallelujah Chorus" moment the first time I got an auto-warp. My annoyance level by that point at having to go back and forth and back and forth across the longest quadrant in the galaxy had already hit the roof at that point, and this mission handled that how it ought to be, if you absolutely must hop system-to-system in that way. I should not have to put up with a giant timegate within a timegate to do my missions and level. Timegateception. And this time I do not mean it as a compliment like I meant Cooperception. :P
Also, everything that took place in "Alliances" was truly plot-relevant in an immediate and obvious way, which would later pay off significantly in "Takedown," so even though there was a section in it that did have a major annoyance factor, I did not feel totally extorted out of my time for having played it.
That annoyance factor had to do with the Hierarchy. Although I've gotten a lot of enjoyment out of using the "Cost-Analysis Matrix" description for some of my own decision-making as a result of Delta Rising, that section of "Alliances" was just hell in a cell, and I have a ship build that has done well against Borg AND against Vaadwaur Heavy Artillery ships. That freaking Voth Bulwark. Now, I did do it before the second NPC nerf, so maybe it would be a different experience now, but that was easily one of the most frustrating battle experiences in all of Delta Rising. The only other one to get that much swearing out of me being when I got ganked in the hangar by that Overseer, but I only had myself to blame for that one, for not doing some careful recon on the map before charging in there. That Bulwark, though...that was just ridiculous, and I finally won by the skin of my teeth after multiple respawns, only to be insulted by the Hierarchy and then...
...given a Hierarchy BOFF at the end.
What?
Normally I am not one to want to turn down a reward, but these guys just insulted me, refused my diplomatic overtures, and now they want to do me the "honor" of having one of their guys on my ship? Maybe there is a different outcome if you don't have to respawn in that mission, but frankly by that point just looking at that BOFF got on my nerves. I almost didn't open the box at all (T5-U...why bother?), and when I finally did, I did it just so I could name him Mr. Potato Head and promptly render him noncanon to any of my fanfiction. I have never been such a jerk to one of my BOFFs, ever. But that's how little sense that bit made.
The Diamonds in the Rough, Maybe...
But what about the few shining impressions out of all those patrols, that could have and probably should have been the seeds to real missions instead of disjointed fragments--the diamonds in the rough that Cryptic left us?
There are two main missions that I would have built up out of that (or maybe two each if enough material could be written).
The first arc I would choose for this "ascension to true mission status" would be the "Benthan Arc." In fact, I can actually see a three-part structure that could be put into a mission...or actually two, now that I think about it.
I suspect that some people probably didn't like the Benthans. I mean, the first thing that happens when they show up on the scene is your player-admiral getting hailed and being told that he or she has been deputized and being called upon to administer Benthan law in the Wild West...I mean the Delta Quadrant. Maybe it helped that I was playing through Delta Rising with a Cardassian, and seeing through his eyes, I found myself immediately saying, "I like these guys!"
Why is that? It doesn't feel like it's often enough on Star Trek that you meet other races with similar ideals to the Federation without actually being the Federation; thinking we have a monopoly on goodness and morals is pretty narrow. The Benthans know right from wrong. They've got their ducks in a row. And unlike many other species we encounter in Star Trek, and in the Delta Quadrant, the Benthans may well know what Janeway's legacy was, but they do not have the time or mental effort to waste on playing the victim card and whining about their quadrant's lot and blaming it all on someone else and acting like they are helpless to change their situation.
No...the Benthans get out there and put their own necks on the line to do something about it. They don't rely on others or expect someone else to do for them what they are unwilling to do for themselves (yeah, Deferi, I am looking at you...pacifism? No, moral cowardice.). If a Benthan justicar has deputized you, he's not doing it to wash his hands of the dirty work and let you shed your blood, sweat, and tears while he watches from a safe distance. He's going to be there actively fighting at your side. Somebody has to be bold enough to take the first step, and in the chaos of that quadrant, it appears it's the Benthans. If someone is going to start a "Federation" out there, it's them, with perhaps a few others at their side (the Talaxians, perhaps--and no, that is not a sarcastic suggestion).
We caught some real flashes of this in the patrols, enough that aside from one unfortunate little incident, even with the fragmented and otherwise severely flawed nature of the patrols, I was able to feel something of a sense of camaraderie there. (And I warned that one captain not to do it again, as I think the Benthans themselves would have been equally blunt and "by-the-book" in reprimanding their own, and my Cardassian would have understood that as few other species could.) It was enough that I would have set up two missions as follows...and I am not joking when I say that I would be utterly thrilled if Cryptic were to actually use these ideas.
Mission 1 of 2: The Fraternal Order
The first mission would start just as the first encounter with the Benthans did--walking into a situation and suddenly getting deputized--except the first thing I would do is make sure that right of the bat, your player-admiral gets a consistent named and memorable posse of Benthan characters to hang out with.
Maybe we still pursue that Ferengi, except there's much more story and character development to explain the variety of shenanigans that we get into with our Benthan buddies, and they really take some time to share their perspective of what life is really like in the Delta Quadrant, and the hopes and dreams that they have for better days. This mission is really the buildup to the second and much part...
Mission 2 of 2: Freedom Is Not Free
This idea is a combination of two patrols that had some of the most memorable, excellent mechanics beyond just a generic "kill five waves," and for me some of the least reservations about getting my character involved.
As I mentioned before, one of the things about the Benthans I admire is that they are willing to stick their necks out and take risks that nobody else in that quadrant is willing to take, in hopes of a better future--and knowing very well that they could pay the ultimate price for it. But that same courage means that their number could very well end up being called someday, and this time, the Benthans get into something that does have very real and very painful consequences for them.
Your Benthan friend from the previous mission fills you in on how things have been going since the last time you met, and he approaches you with a tantalizing proposition: let's hide out behind these asteroids and set up a sting operation to take out some Vaadwaur that have been causing trouble in and around a neighborhood of Benthan systems, disrupting trade, and generally threatening the Benthans because of what they have been doing to stand up to the Vaadwaur and the other troublemakers of the quadrant. The Benthans, however, aren't about to stop or to give up, and they would like your help as they fight back.
The mission is a resounding success. You get a little time to kick back with your Benthan friend and high-five each other for your success, when suddenly the two of you receive one of the most sickening distress calls imaginable: incensed at having been made fools of in such a blatant way by the Benthans, the Vaadwaur have launched a full-scale assault on the colony where this happened and are bent on utterly cleansing this world...total war, no survivors, full destruction of ecosystem is their goal. Just like Gaul made a lesson out of the Talaxian colonists, he's hellbent on making a much bigger lesson out of the Benthans in line with the much bigger threat that they present.
We go into something very much like what we saw of the patrol in the current version of the game, but there is much more to humanize what is going on and to show the havoc being wreaked below. If ever something cried out for a cutscene, this would be it. Show the player why they are fighting. (And give Eldex one more thing he had better answer properly for...or could perhaps intentionally make the player uncomfortable by not outright condemning...) And while the player does succeed in helping the Benthans save many lives from the colony and perhaps dealing enough damage to the Vaadwaur that they can't just slag the planet completely as they planned, we get one more cutscene where we see the Benthan colony fall.
Together you share moment of silence to remember that freedom is not free.
(If you're a Romulan or Reman, special mention MUST be worked in to remember the falls of Virinat and Crateris. No ifs, ands, or buts.)
And then, with very little fanfare, pomp, or circumstances, we see that our Benthan friend, despite his grief and horror at what has just happened, will not give up the fight and give in to terrorists.
Now that right there is a MISSION. The seeds were there. I just wish they had been put together that way.
The second mission (maybe set of two missions but I am not sure if there is enough material for more than one) should deal with the Cooperative-Octanti arc. Hugh was a character we should have seen a lot more of, and developed his story since "Descent," to explain how he got out here and what has been going on since then. The official Star Trek novels made a serious error in offing him, and STO really should have taken more of an opportunity to make that right. Stringing out the Cooperative arc in patrols really robbed us of the chance to see that happen and to capitalize on a character that in my opinion had a lot going for him in the series and a lot more potential to build on.
And since the Cooperative-Octanti arc was so much about prejudice and interpersonal dynamics, and there was something more than pew-pew-pew (except for the stupidity of forcing me to solve their second little breakout of violence with my phasers on both sides...when I only wanted to fire on the Octanti for being bigots, if I absolutely had no choice), this arc was rife with potential. Especially since this was intended to lead into the Big New Borg STF, there REALLY should have been more to it, by far.
Finally, I should note that I would find a way to squeeze the "Solar Flare Patrol" in there as part of that, because quite frankly, that fight and that mechanic was just awesome, especially the way it made you have to think about when to use your get-out-of-Dodge buttons versus trying to brace against the impact of the Vaadwaur cannon barrage (because you might need to escape the flare later). That was the equal of the Benthan colony patrol, and one of the two most memorable patrols for how you had to fight, and it got completely squandered where it was.
Two more patrols were memorable enough and plot-relevant enough that I think they could have been incorporated successfully into other full missions: Trash-Talking Talaxians, and Don't Tell Eldex! My guess is that even by giving them those names, they're memorable enough for readers to remember, too.
Trash-Talking Talaxians was awesome just for seeing the Talaxians get themselves in trouble for mouthing off to a Vaadwaur that...well, for all we know could have started developing sympathies for Eldex's side, but got pushed a bridge too far by basically being insulted and spat at for offering help. (Or it could have just been a trap. But still, you do have to wonder.) I think this would have been an opportunity for Neelix to step back in and bridge the gap between the Neelix that we saw in "Reunion" and "All That Glitters," and show greater maturity and become the person that we actually trust in combat in "Takedown."
It would have been really interesting to see him have to take that Talaxian captain to task for his behavior. I have actually seen this IRL where on a few occasions, someone that you didn't think would have been fit for the job will actually rise to meet the responsibility when it is put on them, and Neelix could have had a moment like that if he had to see behavior like his own put on display to such potentially disastrous consequences, and have to correct another for it. It could well have made a critical wake-up call for him that would prepare him for his critical role later down the line.
Don't Tell Eldex!--while the fight itself was not hugely memorable, it added value in showing how disorganized the Vaadwaur are, in light of the revelation about the bluegills, and I think that uncertainty would have been nice at the end of the last mission right before "Takedown."
All in all, the patrols had a very unfortunate effect of both appearing as filler, and as not enough filler. The predictability of all but the standouts among them really got old, and I would even point out that doing enough of them even hurt me physically (my elbow and wrist still have not fully recovered).
But while my patience with them hit absolute rock bottom by the end of the experience, the saddest thing when I had time to really sit back and think about it later (especially writing my "revised take" on the Benthan arc) was the fact that there actually were some real diamonds in the rough there, that get absolutely overlooked because of the way in which the material was presented and the lack of development it received.
The strong sense I get from this is of a product pushed out way too soon, and without enough development to justify being a full expansion or season. There may have been quantity--though not enough to match the leveling demands as there should have been--but the quality was not what I had hoped for. And what's also sad is the detrimental effect that has on the eight Space Mission Arc episodes that I talked about in my previous post, that absolutely should not have been.
As I believe I have illustrated above, there is at least one path to fixing this, one that would as I see it, yield four to five full episodes, leaving "Alliances" basically intact, but hugely overhauling the material that would make up the other three to four episodes. (And how thrilled I would be to see "The Fraternal Order" and "Freedom Is Not Free" actually made as described!) Perhaps future seasons of STO could release material that would alleviate some of the sense of a grind and flesh out the story.
But as it currently is...this is a great loss to Delta Rising.
The last of the three arcs, despite having a rather broken-up delivery as well, delivered a different experience to me. And based on many posts I have read, I expect that to some, my opinion may well be rather controversial.
Tomorrow: The Kobali Ground Arc. And answers by me to the unanswered comments before and after this post.
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See... I can agree with that. My opinion of Janeway is all over the place.
That's actually why I'd like to see her in control of Temporal Investigations.
There's a process that shifts Temporal Investigations from a "non-intereference"/"traditional timecops" approach in the 24th century to fighting a temporal cold war in the 26th century to engaging in proactive time travel ops in the 29th, which includes killing Federation citizens to manage the timeline (Future's End) or trying and punishing people for crimes they have not yet committed (Relativity). The integrity of the timeline concept goes from one of avoiding complications and begrudgingly accepting Kirk's approach (The Temporal Prime Directive) to saying "Tempus Fugit" as a kind of salute and regarding timeline meddling and punishment of the not-yet-guilty as a kind of duty.
It's a curiously dark path for the Federation. When I watch Relativity, I feel a bit of Alfred Bester and Philip K. **** creeping into my Star Trek. The future Federation aren't really the good guys and they might even be enemies. They seem to be a scarred people, maybe even totalitarian and assured of their own correctness.
And all of that, to me, reads as Janeway's character problems, her sense of command, her inconsistency, her fascination with time travel and the ways she dealt with that... All of that being a sort of shadow that casts its way across the Federation.
Her best and worst qualities and finest and worst moments (Year of Hell, Endgame, Shattered) are the foundation for what Temporal Ops will be in the future.
That's why I like Janeway there.
Because it allows me to feel ambivalent and conflicted about her. I think she has some of the right experience and thinking for the job. I also think she has the potential to shove everything Roddenberry hoped for out an airlock and mess things up royally. For me, it's a mix of "this seems like a logical step" and "this is terrifying, somebody stop her."
For Janeway, it would never be Section 31. I think she'd have too much principal to routinely engage in assassination and statecraft at the political level. No, I think what risks seducing her to the dark side isn't pragmatic solutions but is technical capability.
'
She would never assassinate an innocent through conventional means because they need to die for the greater good.
She absolutely would assassinate an innocent if she had the technical capability to do so in a beneficial way because the technology would be too tempting not to use.
That seems accurate, right? She would never sacrifice her principles on moral grounds. But she would sacrifice every principal in the name of novel technical advancement.
It's both inspiring and chilling. It's complicated. I want to see Janeway get that level of complication if we see her again.
The same is true in a grander sense for Trek captains. Take something like the Hugh problem, whether to commit genocide against the Borg in "I, Borg". (Inidentally, I liked seeing Hugh in STO.)
The question is whether or nor to wipe out the Borg using a virus.
Archer, I think, would do it and muse that he hopes people in the future would find better solutions. "We're not yet advanced enough to make the right decision. So we'll make the wrong decision and hope it buys humanity time to make better decisions."
Kirk would find a magic third solution (ie. use the virus but change what it was designed to do) and muse about the terrible burden of command and whether he should have just taken one of the two solutions he was originally given. "I reject all of the options I'm presented with. I reject the entire scenario. Heaven help me if I'm wrong."
For Picard, it was ultimately about letting personal emotion go in the name of principal and he didn't use it. "What kind of people would we be if we did this?"
For Sisko, it would be about the good of officers under his command and the human outcomes. He'd use the virus and let it weigh on him. "You may or may not agree with my actions. Personally, I acknowledge that they're deplorable. But I refuse to do the right thing if it means writing some ensign's parents a letter telling them their daughter is dead because I did the right thing."
For Janeway, it would be about the technical dimensions of it. She could go either way. She might delete the virus. "Some solutions are too tempting to use." She might use it. "The technology is too tempting not to use while we have the advantage." But ultimately, principal and humanity and even the burden of command for her all cease to matter for her. It's ultimately about the technology for her. Always the technology.
Haha. I have made the Washington comparison. Also, the man Washington has often been compared to: Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus.
From Wikipedia:
Interestingly enough, Praetor D'Tan gives me much more of a Lincoln vibe.
The natural course for the Romulan Republic, in my opinion, would be for D'Tan to get assassinated by old style Romulans within the Republic and for Obisek to become FORCED (against his will) into the role of Praetor.
While it is definitely unprofessional and I wish he would take that to the ready room, at least the way I put together the backstory I had the distinct impression that the "permission to speak freely" ship sailed a *long* time ago where Tovan and your captain are concerned--that even before the Elachi destroyed Virinat "you" and Tovan were the type who didn't shy away from many topics.
At least in my own rendition of the backstory, Tovan had a very, very hard time adjusting to a more professional relationship while on the bridge and had to be reined in numerous times by Shalrak. It probably caused some strain between them for a time, though they recovered from it.
He wasn't a professional and unlike, say, Janeway, he wasn't trained for his position and was never supposed to be in it in the first place. So does he make some stupid decisions? You bet. But I can forgive him as I somewhat forgive Archer (similar inexperience and literal ignorance) where I can't Janeway.
Thanks...and I hope they do, too!
Aside from his penchant for WMD's, I can definitely see that. Even as an enemy he was nobler than many.
Yeah, I can see that. "A house divided against itself cannot stand."
The unfortunate question that I have to ask is, do you think the Romulan Republic has advanced enough in racial attitudes--and the hurt from Shinzon's reign--to be able to accept a Reman as their ruler?
Leviathan, when you outline the history of the Department of Temporal Investigations, I can see your point more. While it's not something I have a great interest in, it makes more sense now.
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I'd compare D'tan almost to Neville Chamberlain, who seems to have never entertained the possibility that Hitler was not a nice man.
Obisek, yeah, you take any honorable general from history and add in shades of James Bond and Rambo, and there you have him. Which is part of why I like him, he's totally the Dalinar just with an extra aura of mystery and kickass.
That's a really fascinating question. If this were a show, maybe not? Maybe that would be a source of drama and intrigue? A real Othello kind of story.
As it stands, I think it's likely we'd find magic plot bullets to legitimize his case.
There's some speculation that Remans are Romulan offspring, either hybrids or mutates.
Maybe we could get back to some of the interesting talk about "The Sundering" and such to establish Obisek's pedigree or shame his opponents into silence. Or saddle him with an accomplishment so big, it silences critics. Like discovering the old capital city intact in subspace and freeing and reuniting ten million survivors with their families. A legendary deed.
Sorry, when I saw the title, I immediately thought of "Reanimator." Jeff Combs at his crazy best. Somehow I felt compelled to share that.
And this thread is nowhere near as awesome.
I was wondering though. Would you be interested in doing the same thing regarding the rest of the games content from start to finish? I would be really interested if you could give this same thought layout to everything else in game. The way you have explained everything has made me rethink some things that have happened so far, a different perspective if you will. Anyways good job and can't wait for the rest.