Brief aside about Lae'nas (Spoilers! for Blood of Ancients)

quantummeerkat

Hi All,

So a couple of players mentioned that they felt it would have been more dramatic for Lae'nas to be destroyed than simply the Archive.

I considered this, and it may have in fact been more dramatic. However, among other reasons, I think the Iconians are master manipulators, using leverage and minimum effort, to achieve their aims. As opposed to say, the Undine, who wanted to sterilize the galaxy and use brute force.

To the Iconians, the Archive was the only danger, so not worth the expense of time and energy to destroy the entire planet.

We often have to make these kinds of tough choices as designers. And almost never does everybody agree.

Thanks,
Jaddua Ross

gavinruneblade

Thanks for the explanation (here and in the main thread)!

amosov78

It makes some sense; the Iconians have returned from holiday to find a bunch of kids on their lawn. They want the kids gone but wouldn't burn down their property just to achieve it.

reximuz

For me the only thing was the graphic was so to the point that it looked like some kind of planet killer enveloping a large portion of the planet, then the next scene, the planet looks like it alway did. The effect looked cool, but it was probably overkill for a not blow up the whole planet effect.

psycoticvulcan

Thanks for the explanation. It does make sense that they wouldn't want to destroy their future domain, though I agree the effect is a bit overdone. Adding that giant scorch mark to the planet would make it better, I think.

quantummeerkat

psycoticvulcan wrote: »

Thanks for the explanation. It does make sense that they wouldn't want to destroy their future domain, though I agree the effect is a bit overdone. Adding that giant scorch mark to the planet would make it better, I think.

Sure. Yes, giant scorch incoming.

omgbamf00

I have to admit, I assumed the planet was gone after seeing the orange heat cracks envelope the entire surface shortly followed by an explosion sound.

theraven2378

Nice work, it's about time us players had to suffer a story driven defeat, it proves that we are not invincible

phantrosity

quantummeerkat wrote: »

Hi All,

So a couple of players mentioned that they felt it would have been more dramatic for Lae'nas to be destroyed than simply the Archive.

I considered this, and it may have in fact been more dramatic. However, among other reasons, I think the Iconians are master manipulators, using leverage and minimum effort, to achieve their aims.

I assume this is why everyone's being manipulated to beat up the tholians too, right? Since the Tholians keep showing that they're really close to fully understanding iconian gateway tech, but the player captain keeps going in and interfering?

gulberat

omgbamf00 wrote: »

I have to admit, I assumed the planet was gone after seeing the orange heat cracks envelope the entire surface shortly followed by an explosion sound.

Yeah, it looked like the timeline where the Xindi Superweapon destroyed Earth...almost an identical effect.

oldkhemaraa

quantummeerkat wrote: »

Hi All,

So a couple of players mentioned that they felt it would have been more dramatic for Lae'nas to be destroyed than simply the Archive.

I considered this, and it may have in fact been more dramatic. However, among other reasons, I think the Iconians are master manipulators, using leverage and minimum effort, to achieve their aims. As opposed to say, the Undine, who wanted to sterilize the galaxy and use brute force.

To the Iconians, the Archive was the only danger, so not worth the expense of time and energy to destroy the entire planet.

We often have to make these kinds of tough choices as designers. And almost never does everybody agree.

Thanks,
Jaddua Ross

Makes great sense.. now of course it does beg a question

1. We Delta types go back in time to speak to our past self from there..
2. Iconains can't time travel sefely so thy may not be entirely conversant with the ramifications of time travel...
3. My Delta future still has her temporal toy so.. perhaps we Delta's should take a little step through the mirror and maybe make sure some Preservers get away. I'm sure section 31 would be more then willing to assist.. and they owe your toon some favors anyway.


..... because we never did get the information from the Preservers we went there to get.

..... and wouldn't it be a hoot to preserve the preservers right under the Iconians collective.. well, what ever they have that passes for noses.

woodwhity

So, they destroy that archive and risk that not every preserver tech on the planet is destroyed, maybe a backup of some files anywhere decentralized stored. Doubt they would risk that chance, especially since they seem to be able to easily destroy planets and energy is not a problem for them.

As a matter of fact, there is a huge amount of preserver tech on defera. Can we have have the Iconians taking care of defera?

But as others said, this episode need a rewrite. We had all the time to ask the preservers about the Iconians, yet we do it just when they attack. Doesnt make sense. Not the least of it.

mrspidey2

Wait...the planet wasn't detroyed??

The FX do make it look like the planet itself gets blown to smithereens.
And yes, I assumed Lae'nas still being intact on the System map aftwerwards was just one of many bugs...

warpangel

theraven2378 wrote: »

Nice work, it's about time us players had to suffer a story driven defeat, it proves that we are not invincible

If you call losing a more-or-less forgotten hole in a more-or-less forgotten planet a defeat...sure. :cool:

Starbase 234 (or whatever the number was)...well that was a defeat, but not ours. We could've beaten the Heralds if command hadn't forced us to leave.

The Heralds destroying the gate on New Rom...that everyone thought was already destroyed in Sphere of Influence :rolleyes:...that happened after we left, too.

Player's still invincible.

amosov78

woodwhity wrote: »

So, they destroy that archive and risk that not every preserver tech on the planet is destroyed, maybe a backup of some files anywhere decentralized stored. Doubt they would risk that chance, especially since they seem to be able to easily destroy planets and energy is not a problem for them.

As a matter of fact, there is a huge amount of preserver tech on defera. Can we have have the Iconians taking care of defera?

But as others said, this episode need a rewrite. We had all the time to ask the preservers about the Iconians, yet we do it just when they attack. Doesnt make sense. Not the least of it.

It's more likely that the Breen missions will get dialogue changes, since Geko has mentioned wanting to revisit that arc at some point. It'd be easy enough for them to add in that it'll take time for the revival process to take effect, and that the Iconian attack in this recent episode coincides with the date that a Preserver can be safely awakened.

theraven2378

warpangel wrote: »

If you call losing a more-or-less forgotten hole in a more-or-less forgotten planet a defeat...sure. :cool:

Starbase 234 (or whatever the number was)...well that was a defeat, but not ours. We could've beaten the Heralds if command hadn't forced us to leave.

The Heralds destroying the gate on New Rom...that everyone thought was already destroyed in Sphere of Influence :rolleyes:...that happened after we left, too.

Player's still invincible.

But story wise, round 1 goes to the Iconians, they inflicted a savage defeat on the alliance with the alliance suffering a 25% ship loss overall.

At least we got some retribution in delta flight, round 2 to the alliance

captaintrueheart

oldkhemaraa wrote: »

We Delta types go back in time to speak to our past self from there..

This whole mission (Blood of the Ancients) really bugs me... First we find this ancient all knowledgeable race. However it appears we simply ignore them, then when faced with war versus an omnipotent enemy we wait until they are literally on their way to the archive before bothering to ask the Preservers for any info on the Iconians.

However, once we actually DO ask, the guy provides nothing useful, then the Iconians show up and kill them all.

In terms of galactic TRIBBLE-ups, this has to the worst. Starfleet needs to just surrender, dismantle the fleet and accept their fate, they brought it all upon themselves.

From a story standpoint, it's pretty sad that the only way of dealing with the preservers was to wipe them out. Or are we going to get to play Indiana Jones again and find yet another preserver archive?

Here's an idea... maybe we could use the whole "Mirror Universe" construct and find the mirror universe Iconians... who should be good guys and as such have them come fight the bad Iconians. If we're going to go bananapants crazy might as well wear the whole suit!

lan451

Interesting. I thought that the planet was destroyed and that it just bugged out since it was still there after the shot was fired.

I would agree that the FX used for the shot was far too much. I do like that the planet wasn't destroyed now that I know that. Just need to have it look like a surgical strike and not a planet killing destroyer beam.

antonine3258

I honestly thought they'd blown up the planet. I like the idea of them not blowing it up but simply incising the Archive from a story perspective.

From the 'keep the oldest species in the Galaxy aroudn' perspective, it kinda bites.

Didn't some Preservers leave cold-storage to talk with the younger races, though?

woodwhity

theraven2378 wrote: »

But story wise, round 1 goes to the Iconians, they inflicted a savage defeat on the alliance with the alliance suffering a 25% ship loss overall.

At least we got some retribution in delta flight, round 2 to the alliance

But only because the command seems to be less than your average STO-Joe. If command was an actually capably group, that one would have been at least a draw.

theraven2378

woodwhity wrote: »

But only because the command seems to be less than your average STO-Joe. If command was an actually capably group, that one would have been at least a draw.

Where does that leave the next engagement?, so far the war has been very one sided with the heralds routing alliance forces, New Romulus was a pyrrhic victory at best and Starbase 234 the biggest military disaster since the near complete destruction the federation alliance fleet at Chin'toka.

The Delta Flight cavalry raid proved to be a success and a strategic victory, I'm just waiting for the next big battle of the war.

wanderintx

Any universe where time travel is a relatively easy possibility negates a lot of dramatic impact. That said, I doubt our fix to this mess will come so easily.

captz1pp

Offing the preservers is one way to tell that the Iconians are devs incarnate, chance to research living history, can't let that happen, lol.

Anyway, given what we saw and heard in this mission, will the Tholians(who should have put up a better fight), or really old species like the Gorn(there could be a reason why the Iconians got the Undine to infiltrate their ranks) react to all this?