I don't know that the Voth would be too old, though...The Preserver that gets killed by M'Tara tells you that the Iconinans are the first of their children IIRC. Since the Voth are also their children (as are we, by the storyline) it would stand to reason that the Voth are not as old as the Iconinans.
I could be wrong, though. Been a while since I played that particular mission.
Qapla'!
The Voths are Saurian, the preservers are mammals. I suspect the preservers planted more mammals as there weren't others like them. There aren't many saurians out there so it's entirely possible the Voth evolved separately from the preservers and thus aren't their children. The Voth have quite a dislike of mammals. The Iconians could be why.
I remain empathetic to the concerns of my community, but do me a favor and lay off the god damn name calling and petty remarks. It will get you nowhere.
I must admit, respect points to Trendy for laying down the law like that.
Oh, come oooon, you expect me to have read a thread I'm posting in :rolleyes:.
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
The Borg are not 600k years old as someone claimed in this forum the last time there was a discussion of "The Other," but appear to be considerably younger:
So yeah, they are billions of years old, because we have never seen the Borg engage in time travel at all, right? Oh, wait, yes we have. So I'm going with 4527 BCE, which would make the Borg a little more than 6900 years old. When you take into account the fact that they had not yet taken over the entire galaxy by the time of VOY, let alone ENT, the supposed 600k age becomes rather unlikely, to say the least.
I would be the one to point out that the information you quote is from Star Trek: Destiny, a trilogy of books most decidedly outside of canon, especially so for Star Trek Online. In Destiny, the Borg are ended for good, which is impossible to fit into STO since the Borg are still clearly around.
The Voths are Saurian, the preservers are mammals. I suspect the preservers planted more mammals as there weren't others like them. There aren't many saurians out there so it's entirely possible the Voth evolved separately from the preservers and thus aren't their children. The Voth have quite a dislike of mammals. The Iconians could be why.
Or maybe the Preservers are:
Related to the Tholians, Crystalline life forms.
Related to the Changelings.
Related to the Borg's technological half.
Let me tie together for you a quick, entirely hypothetical sketch of a mythology. In the beginning was the Preserver race and they were lonely. So they created evolving machine life. The Iconians were the first and the most advanced but they proved... needy. The Preservers went on to develop the Pralor and the Cravic. The androids like Ruk's race proved to be of more interest still.
The Preservers moved on to trying to create organic life. The Tholians came first. The Changelings were the height of that achievement. The Preservers still felt alone.
The Preservers decided to start speeding up and advancing the evolution of sentience in the bacteria of a thousand worlds and became sheparding examples of what they were looking for when they found it, guiding evolution by protecting the sentients from evolutionary cataclysms and giving them technology.
The Iconians grew jealous and began gathering the early rejects of the Preservers' experiments as a cult even as the Preservers continued favoring their newer children. The Changelings, jealous and scorned, withdrew to create life of their own that would worship them using Preserver technology.
Meanwhile, another machine race -- surprise -- turns out to be the Tkon (who we never knew anything about, including whether they were organic). The Tkon wanted to be a good child but felt isolated by the Preservers' organic bias. So 200,000 years ago, the Tkon withdrew to a handful of systems to focus on being better children. They wanted to be the best so they studied all the species the Preservers loved more than them. These androids started lopping off the arms and feet of organic life that the Preservers wanted more. They started grafting organic skin of races the Preservers loved more onto their metal frames. They ignored species that the Preservers had rejected. They were androids who sought perfection. They are the Borg. Cyborgs formed from machine life fusing the seized remains of organic life onto their frames. They seek perfection. They seek the love of their maker.
well, the featured episode right now... discusses it even further, someone who saved them
That's old news. Both the guardian of forever and the prophets pointed that out. One of them (I think the guardian) additionally mentions the other will save them again.
Also do note it is always said as "the other" singular. Never "the others" plural.
But after replaying the mission again, I realized I messed up. Though I still like the idea of us returning to Sha'Ka'Ree and confronting "god", which ends up being a part of a Galactic chess match by the Q. Where "god" was playing the Iconians, and Q the Federation (which ends up overall part of the Q's test for humanity).
The "Other" that they keep referring to can only be one thing. It's the return of The Sisko! I mean, he did smack Q and get away with it. I can see him coming back and slapping the Iconians around a bit.
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,666Community Moderator
I don't know... but I have a feeling that The Other may be some kind of puppet master. Up until now, the Iconians had been manipulating events to weaken various powers that could oppose them. The Fed/Klingon War, destruction of Romulus, pissing off the Undine, destabilizing the Delta Quadrant with the vengeful Vaadwaur... All geared towards making everyone fight each other in order to weaken them before their forces arrive to mop up.
However... in the new FE... we see the Iconians converse with each other... and they are almost reverent about something... which leads me to believe... they may not be the ones really pulling the strings. Something bigger is going on, and the Iconians are like the wrecking ball. But even a wrecking ball has a tether of some sort.
Now... in order to save the Iconians... The Other would have to be something of equal or greater power than the Iconians, most likely greater power.
One thing that came to mind for me was one potential unresolved thread from Enterprise. The Sphere Builders. They manipulated the Xindi to attack Earth in the 22nd Century because in one timeline the Federation successfully repelled the Sphere Builders at... what was it... Procyon V. The Sphere Builders can examine various timelines, and are transdimensional beings. Procyon V took place in the 26th Century in one timeline. What if the Iconian War was a contengency plan of theirs to try and pave the way for their own invasion?
Think about it. Weaken native forces 100 years before they were supposed to oppose them, use a more powerful force to destroy them, then destroy the weakened victors. And with their transdimenional nature and advanced Temporal tech... the Sphere Builders would be able to neutralize the Iconians pretty easily.
But why not strike at the Federation? They fear the Federation and the other Alpha Quadrant powers because they've seen their downfall at Procyon V. The Federation is a sleeping Dragon and they want to kill it before it wakes sort of thing.
I can't take it anymore! Could everyone just chill out for two seconds before something CRAZY happens again?!
The nut who actually ground out many packs. The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite colored text = mod mode
I was exploring the House of Pegh and came across a few records...
the last one in the last room makes mention that they are not whole, even without the other. They need the Other to be whole.
This is a iconian we haven't met yet.
I'd laugh my pointy ears off if after everything, "the other" turned out to be Q and we had to play one of his stoopid games to end the war, after this whole Krenim business fails.....
Edit, now that I do think of it though, I'd like to know how Q fits in on the Richter scale with the Iconians. And the Borg too for that matter, (although I'm guessing the Borg are a newer race), still wonder how well the Borg would face off against the Iconians with their ability to adapt and all.
I could see one of the Q stirring up all the younger races for their amusement. I would imagine the Iconians would be inferior to Q, being as the Q are omnipotent and all.
The Borg are not 600k years old as someone claimed in this forum the last time there was a discussion of "The Other," but appear to be considerably younger:
So yeah, they are billions of years old, because we have never seen the Borg engage in time travel at all, right? Oh, wait, yes we have. So I'm going with 4527 BCE, which would make the Borg a little more than 6900 years old. When you take into account the fact that they had not yet taken over the entire galaxy by the time of VOY, let alone ENT, the supposed 600k age becomes rather unlikely, to say the least.
I would be the one to point out that the information you quote is from Star Trek: Destiny, a trilogy of books most decidedly outside of canon, especially so for Star Trek Online. In Destiny, the Borg are ended for good, which is impossible to fit into STO since the Borg are still clearly around.
Look again at the source material:
ST - Destiny novel: Lost Souls; TOS novel: Probe; ST short story: "The Hunted"; TNG novel: Vendetta
So yeah, not all of the quoted info comes from Destiny. My point in this was people in a previous thread going on about how the Borg are supposedly so much older than the Iconians, which ignores the fact that various dates have been given for their origin. It also ignores the facticity of the Borg having only a relatively small territory when the Federation first encounters them in the 22nd century, which suggests the Borg are still a relatively young species at that time. The date I gave as my choice, 4527 BCE, comes from the Destiny novels; the other dates are from various other sources. And frankly, I think 4527 BCE is too early, but it certainly makes more sense than 600,000 years ago or several billion years ago in light of the Borg not already being dominant throughout the galaxy by the 22nd century. And Borg activity at such ancient dates is easily explained away by time travel, which we saw the Borg do in First Contact (which is canon), rather than unwarranted assumptions that the Borg have been around that long. Ockham's razor and all that.
I was exploring the House of Pegh and came across a few records...
the last one in the last room makes mention that they are not whole, even without the other. They need the Other to be whole.
This is a iconian we haven't met yet.
I'd laugh my pointy ears off if after everything, "the other" turned out to be Q and we had to play one of his stoopid games to end the war, after this whole Krenim business fails.....
Edit, now that I do think of it though, I'd like to know how Q fits in on the Richter scale with the Iconians. And the Borg too for that matter, (although I'm guessing the Borg are a newer race), still wonder how well the Borg would face off against the Iconians with their ability to adapt and all.
I could see one of the Q stirring up all the younger races for their amusement. I would imagine the Iconians would be inferior to Q, being as the Q are omnipotent and all.
Q is omnipotent, indeed. So whatever scale for power you use, he's at the upper end.
But being omnipotent, he doesn't really need to conquer or attack anything. So it's doubtful he's in any way "related" to the Iconians, other than as an amused observer and maybe occassional meddler for his personal amusement.
He's a deus ex machina, basically. The only type of problems he's likely to solve are the ones he has caused himself.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
Now... in order to save the Iconians... The Other would have to be something of equal or greater power than the Iconians, most likely greater power.
One thing that came to mind for me was one potential unresolved thread from Enterprise. The Sphere Builders. They manipulated the Xindi to attack Earth in the 22nd Century because in one timeline the Federation successfully repelled the Sphere Builders at... what was it... Procyon V. The Sphere Builders can examine various timelines, and are transdimensional beings. Procyon V took place in the 26th Century in one timeline. What if the Iconian War was a contengency plan of theirs to try and pave the way for their own invasion?
Think about it. Weaken native forces 100 years before they were supposed to oppose them, use a more powerful force to destroy them, then destroy the weakened victors. And with their transdimenional nature and advanced Temporal tech... the Sphere Builders would be able to neutralize the Iconians pretty easily.
But why not strike at the Federation? They fear the Federation and the other Alpha Quadrant powers because they've seen their downfall at Procyon V. The Federation is a sleeping Dragon and they want to kill it before it wakes sort of thing.
This does make sense. If the Sphere Builders are manipulating the Iconians, they have apparently chosen their tool well. Immensely powerful in order to subjugate opposition, but vulnerable to time-travelling enemies, so easy to take down when the job is done. Unfortunately for the Sphere Builders (if that is who the Other is), we'll have used time travel to defeat the Iconians, avoiding defeat ourselves.
Your father was captain of a starship for twelve minutes. He saved 800 lives, including your mother's, and yours.
hmm, I'm not sure it could be the sphere builders unless they have been dramatically changed since the fall of Iconia - because they can not live in normal space.
I do think it would be funny if the first 5 years of STO were Q's prank - our very own Farpoint Station. And now that it's over we can begin our missions!
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
Since I like to be meta, I'm going to take a step back and look at what's coming up.
My prediction is this:
We're going to use the Krenim temporal weapon but this is a red herring solution.
We use the weapon on Iconia, wiping out the Iconians after maybe doing some timeline analysis. This results in an altered timeline that at first glimpse might seem okay aside from wiping out one TNG episode, one DS9 episode, and probably the Vaadwaur episode of Voyager. Much of the timeline SHOULD still be intact.
The timeline as we know it MIGHT be mostly intact. However, there are two variables we can't account for our characters' present knowledge. The first and obvious one is who "The Other" is because wiping out Iconia probably wipes out "The Other" and "The Other" might be important to our history. Or might not. The history is PROBABLY somewhat recognizable. Spock might even be back. Which brings us to the main point: The bigger, immediate issue is that it brings back Romulus, which sounds nice but might not be so nice in practice. Romulus had a tumultuous history pre-Hobus. They were on the verge of unlocking a LOT about Borg technology at The Vault.
Again, I'm using story-thinking, not in-universe thinking.
I think we use the Krenim weapon on the Iconians and it results in a history with big, important gaps in it and probably a new Borg-Romulan Collective on the rampage in a galaxy diminished for loss of The Other, with Romulus intact but with its return proving that its destruction was necessary. We can't assume that had Romulus not been destroyed that it would still be like the TNG era Romulus. Things might have gotten worse and the culture might have changed due to their Borg research.
We set the timeline right after a crazy "Year of Hell" mission that pits us against a revived Romulan Star Empire that even Tal Shiar loyalist players would find unappealing. Maybe we get help from Captain Walker of the 29th century.
So that leaves us with a big question mark about The Other. I think we'll then realize that since we can't just use time tech to wipe out the Iconians the easy way, we can use it to LEARN about them and identify The Other. We go back in time either to Mol'rihan or the Dyson Sphere in the ancient past (maybe both) and -- this is key -- we learn who The Other is and see what the Iconians were like before they became dark.
Then, with our KNOWLEDGE of The Other, we track them down present day and seek their aid. The Other saved the Iconians before. Now we must seek The Other's aid or learn about The Other.
We marshal our forces and defeat the Iconians with The Other's assistance. However, issues remain with the Krenim (who might take advantage of our efforts to restore part of their empire) and The Other (who may not be friendly).
I lean towards The Other being the Hurq, which gives us a new Klingon-centric Gamma Quadrant meta-plot.
It's a stretch, but still a possibility. I do like the possibility of the Fek'lhr being a tie-in, too, but it still leaves the question of who's holding the reigns regarding the Fek'lhr in the first place. It's still possible they're some entity/race's versions of Heralds & so forth, too.
The Borg are not 600k years old as someone claimed in this forum the last time there was a discussion of "The Other," but appear to be considerably younger:
So yeah, they are billions of years old, because we have never seen the Borg engage in time travel at all, right? Oh, wait, yes we have. So I'm going with 4527 BCE, which would make the Borg a little more than 6900 years old. When you take into account the fact that they had not yet taken over the entire galaxy by the time of VOY, let alone ENT, the supposed 600k age becomes rather unlikely, to say the least.
I would be the one to point out that the information you quote is from Star Trek: Destiny, a trilogy of books most decidedly outside of canon, especially so for Star Trek Online. In Destiny, the Borg are ended for good, which is impossible to fit into STO since the Borg are still clearly around.
Look again at the source material:
ST - Destiny novel: Lost Souls; TOS novel: Probe; ST short story: "The Hunted"; TNG novel: Vendetta
So yeah, not all of the quoted info comes from Destiny. My point in this was people in a previous thread going on about how the Borg are supposedly so much older than the Iconians, which ignores the fact that various dates have been given for their origin. It also ignores the facticity of the Borg having only a relatively small territory when the Federation first encounters them in the 22nd century, which suggests the Borg are still a relatively young species at that time. The date I gave as my choice, 4527 BCE, comes from the Destiny novels; the other dates are from various other sources. And frankly, I think 4527 BCE is too early, but it certainly makes more sense than 600,000 years ago or several billion years ago in light of the Borg not already being dominant throughout the galaxy by the 22nd century. And Borg activity at such ancient dates is easily explained away by time travel, which we saw the Borg do in First Contact (which is canon), rather than unwarranted assumptions that the Borg have been around that long. Ockham's razor and all that.
Actually my general point is your quote is ultimately meaningless as it's very evident that STO ignores most of the material from the novelverse. Occasionally they'll incorporate things that they like like they did with the Romulans but ultimately most material from the books is irrelevant. It's soft canon to be ignored or heeded at a whim.
Its gotta be Molor and being the fake kahless and fake molor have been killed the real molor must have been resurrected by the iconians. So the next mission will be using kobali tech to make a super dupper reanimated real kahless kobali lol.
The Q is too obvious a choice, plus outside of individuals they tend to stay out of the affairs of lesser races.
The travellers race(?) is a possibility but would more than likely bring up Wesley and Will Wheaton has expressed that he doesn't want to play the character again.
Right now in my mind are time travel shenanigans result in it being us as the other, or the Sphere Builders, either way it's going to either something of immense power, or something we never saw coming.
I think The Other are likely Hurq for several reasons.
Hurq are a Gamma Quadrant bad guy. There are hints dropping (including Sela working with the Dominion now) that the Gamma Quadrant is next. Hurq positions the Klingons for updates and to take center stage for awhile and there are some general Klingon updates in the pipeline, including character model improvements. Hurq are out of left field enough to set us up for several years of new plots and I don't think the Iconians will be taken out without setting up new meta-plots for the game.
I also think that since my inclination is towards a Krenim/Year of Heck episode in the near future where we muck up the timeline, the identity of The Other needs to be something that would muck up the timeline but not immediately reveal the identity of The Other, which I think they will make its own episode.
If the Hurq are an Iconian splinter group, the thing to look for in a Year of Heck episode would be what that does to Klingons. Klingons developed early spaceflight by taking the Hurq's ships. If we wipe out the Iconians and the Hurq are Iconians, the Klingon Empire as we know it would cease to exist. They would likely be pre-Warp, less advanced, or (my guess) largely conquered by the Romulans with Klingon refugees as Federation citizens.
My strong leaning is that if we're getting an episode about why time travel is an imperfect solution (and I think that's where this is headed), the key is to show that a world where Romulus is NOT destroyed is a world where Federation, Klingons, and Romulans are all worse off for the survival of the homeworld. That even the most loyal person to the Empire would sacrifice Romulus again rather than accept what the planet would have become. That likely equates to a ruined Klingon Empire, a Federation on the ropes, and a Romulan Empire with an intact homeworld but which honors Romulan values even less than D'Tan's Republic.
I lean towards the idea of something like Sela or Donatra as a Romulan Collective Queen who has completely stripped almost every Romulan of their free will and converted them into drones. Having mastered the Borg technology (or succumbed to it), the post-Nemesis Romulans in the "dark" timeline might be worse than the original Borg Collective.Looking back, I think what we're building to has to be the reveal that the destruction of the homeworld and fall of the empire was a mercy to Romulans, who are better off. And, in the end, we may have something like Taris making the call that Romulus must die again and that the deaths of everyone in the Hobus event are a worthwhile and tactical sacrifice that must be made. In a way, there could be nothing MORE Romulan than condemning your homeworld to death again for the greater good. That's what Romulans DO. They embrace uncomfortable, amoral sacrifices.
"The Other" is probably one of the Founder. The Dominion and the Iconian Imperial probably had dealings 200,000 years ago. When the subjects of the Iconians defeated them, one Founder probably helped them to come together again and unite.
Now who this Founder is and why s/he helped the Iconians is a huge question. But one thing's for sure, The Preservers and the Founders were one of the original galactic powers in the Milky Way Galaxy.
The Preservers dominated both the Alpha and Beta Quadrants.
The Founders dominated the Gamma Quadrant.
And the mysterious species who originally controlled the "Underspace" in the Delta Quadrant.
In a way, there could be nothing MORE Romulan than condemning your homeworld to death again for the greater good. That's what Romulans DO. They embrace uncomfortable, amoral sacrifices.
Uh. That "greater good" routine is a Vulcan (specifically, a Surakian) thing: "Spunau bolayalar t'Wehku bolayalar t'Zamu il t'Veh." (That's Golic Vulcan for "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one." -- a quote from Surak) D'Tan and other Surakians in Republic society are probably quite fond of this dictum (the legend at the bottom of the memorial to Spahkh supplies at least some evidence for that), but that doesn't mean that this perspective is universal among Romulans.
Also, referring to it as "amoral" seems off. I'm no fan of Mill's Utilitarianism (or any other Consequentialist Ethic, for that matter), but there's a whole segment of ethical philosophers in the real world (as well as, apparently, Surak in the Trek universe) who would argue that such a sacrifice would be ethically praiseworthy.
The scenario you present, however, is an interesting one, value judgments aside.
As for the question of "The Other," ...
One of my fleetmates (Rexyf) pointed out that the faction symbol for the Devidians is the same as the Dyson Rep symbol and FX seen in the spheres:
I then made an observation about a similarity of appearance between the ancient Dewans
and the Devidians
(This isn't about the obvious texture similarities; the video file found at the Gateway under ch'Mol'Rihan was corrupt, and that may not represent an accurate presentation of the Dewan skin. Instead, look at the shape of the heads.) The Devidians look emaciated, while the Dewans appear to be well-fed. The Devidians seem to be rather hungry, insisting "We must feed!"
Then I commented on the fairly common shift in language from a w to a v and vice-versa (Proto-Germanic w was pronounced like modern English w, but in modern German is pronounced like modern English v; Classical Latin v was pronounced like modern English w, but shifted to a modern English v sound sometime during the Mediaeval period after the rise of Old Italian). This is relevant depending on the stem from which both Dewan (given as DiWahn in other sources) and Devidian derive. The original stem of either (or, I would argue, of both) could be something like *dewi-, *dewa-, *deva-, or *devi-, and that would provide some linguistic evidence to add to the "heraldic" evidence and the osteological evidence (specifically the skull shape).
Comments
The Voths are Saurian, the preservers are mammals. I suspect the preservers planted more mammals as there weren't others like them. There aren't many saurians out there so it's entirely possible the Voth evolved separately from the preservers and thus aren't their children. The Voth have quite a dislike of mammals. The Iconians could be why.
*giggles* I'm glad I wasnt the only one to notice the lack of females.
*points at my post from page 1*
Could The Other be...Bob from Accounting?
Aren't both M'Tara and T'Ket female?
Your father was captain of a starship for twelve minutes. He saved 800 lives, including your mother's, and yours.
I dare you to do better.
Oh, come oooon, you expect me to have read a thread I'm posting in :rolleyes:.
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
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I would be the one to point out that the information you quote is from Star Trek: Destiny, a trilogy of books most decidedly outside of canon, especially so for Star Trek Online. In Destiny, the Borg are ended for good, which is impossible to fit into STO since the Borg are still clearly around.
She sounds hideous!
We come in peace, SHOOT TO KILL!
Or maybe the Preservers are:
Related to the Tholians, Crystalline life forms.
Related to the Changelings.
Related to the Borg's technological half.
Let me tie together for you a quick, entirely hypothetical sketch of a mythology. In the beginning was the Preserver race and they were lonely. So they created evolving machine life. The Iconians were the first and the most advanced but they proved... needy. The Preservers went on to develop the Pralor and the Cravic. The androids like Ruk's race proved to be of more interest still.
The Preservers moved on to trying to create organic life. The Tholians came first. The Changelings were the height of that achievement. The Preservers still felt alone.
The Preservers decided to start speeding up and advancing the evolution of sentience in the bacteria of a thousand worlds and became sheparding examples of what they were looking for when they found it, guiding evolution by protecting the sentients from evolutionary cataclysms and giving them technology.
The Iconians grew jealous and began gathering the early rejects of the Preservers' experiments as a cult even as the Preservers continued favoring their newer children. The Changelings, jealous and scorned, withdrew to create life of their own that would worship them using Preserver technology.
Meanwhile, another machine race -- surprise -- turns out to be the Tkon (who we never knew anything about, including whether they were organic). The Tkon wanted to be a good child but felt isolated by the Preservers' organic bias. So 200,000 years ago, the Tkon withdrew to a handful of systems to focus on being better children. They wanted to be the best so they studied all the species the Preservers loved more than them. These androids started lopping off the arms and feet of organic life that the Preservers wanted more. They started grafting organic skin of races the Preservers loved more onto their metal frames. They ignored species that the Preservers had rejected. They were androids who sought perfection. They are the Borg. Cyborgs formed from machine life fusing the seized remains of organic life onto their frames. They seek perfection. They seek the love of their maker.
That's old news. Both the guardian of forever and the prophets pointed that out. One of them (I think the guardian) additionally mentions the other will save them again.
Also do note it is always said as "the other" singular. Never "the others" plural.
It is almost certainly the player.
But after replaying the mission again, I realized I messed up. Though I still like the idea of us returning to Sha'Ka'Ree and confronting "god", which ends up being a part of a Galactic chess match by the Q. Where "god" was playing the Iconians, and Q the Federation (which ends up overall part of the Q's test for humanity).
That little weasel sticks his nose in to all sorts of missions, so I reckon they'll use him ... or ...
Kurland here ...
If I Ever Became An Evil Overlord
However... in the new FE... we see the Iconians converse with each other... and they are almost reverent about something... which leads me to believe... they may not be the ones really pulling the strings. Something bigger is going on, and the Iconians are like the wrecking ball. But even a wrecking ball has a tether of some sort.
Now... in order to save the Iconians... The Other would have to be something of equal or greater power than the Iconians, most likely greater power.
One thing that came to mind for me was one potential unresolved thread from Enterprise. The Sphere Builders. They manipulated the Xindi to attack Earth in the 22nd Century because in one timeline the Federation successfully repelled the Sphere Builders at... what was it... Procyon V. The Sphere Builders can examine various timelines, and are transdimensional beings. Procyon V took place in the 26th Century in one timeline. What if the Iconian War was a contengency plan of theirs to try and pave the way for their own invasion?
Think about it. Weaken native forces 100 years before they were supposed to oppose them, use a more powerful force to destroy them, then destroy the weakened victors. And with their transdimenional nature and advanced Temporal tech... the Sphere Builders would be able to neutralize the Iconians pretty easily.
But why not strike at the Federation? They fear the Federation and the other Alpha Quadrant powers because they've seen their downfall at Procyon V. The Federation is a sleeping Dragon and they want to kill it before it wakes sort of thing.
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite
colored text = mod mode
I'd laugh my pointy ears off if after everything, "the other" turned out to be Q and we had to play one of his stoopid games to end the war, after this whole Krenim business fails.....
Edit, now that I do think of it though, I'd like to know how Q fits in on the Richter scale with the Iconians. And the Borg too for that matter, (although I'm guessing the Borg are a newer race), still wonder how well the Borg would face off against the Iconians with their ability to adapt and all.
I could see one of the Q stirring up all the younger races for their amusement. I would imagine the Iconians would be inferior to Q, being as the Q are omnipotent and all.
Look again at the source material:
ST - Destiny novel: Lost Souls; TOS novel: Probe; ST short story: "The Hunted"; TNG novel: Vendetta
So yeah, not all of the quoted info comes from Destiny. My point in this was people in a previous thread going on about how the Borg are supposedly so much older than the Iconians, which ignores the fact that various dates have been given for their origin. It also ignores the facticity of the Borg having only a relatively small territory when the Federation first encounters them in the 22nd century, which suggests the Borg are still a relatively young species at that time. The date I gave as my choice, 4527 BCE, comes from the Destiny novels; the other dates are from various other sources. And frankly, I think 4527 BCE is too early, but it certainly makes more sense than 600,000 years ago or several billion years ago in light of the Borg not already being dominant throughout the galaxy by the 22nd century. And Borg activity at such ancient dates is easily explained away by time travel, which we saw the Borg do in First Contact (which is canon), rather than unwarranted assumptions that the Borg have been around that long. Ockham's razor and all that.
But being omnipotent, he doesn't really need to conquer or attack anything. So it's doubtful he's in any way "related" to the Iconians, other than as an amused observer and maybe occassional meddler for his personal amusement.
He's a deus ex machina, basically. The only type of problems he's likely to solve are the ones he has caused himself.
This does make sense. If the Sphere Builders are manipulating the Iconians, they have apparently chosen their tool well. Immensely powerful in order to subjugate opposition, but vulnerable to time-travelling enemies, so easy to take down when the job is done. Unfortunately for the Sphere Builders (if that is who the Other is), we'll have used time travel to defeat the Iconians, avoiding defeat ourselves.
Your father was captain of a starship for twelve minutes. He saved 800 lives, including your mother's, and yours.
I dare you to do better.
I do think it would be funny if the first 5 years of STO were Q's prank - our very own Farpoint Station. And now that it's over we can begin our missions!
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
My prediction is this:
We're going to use the Krenim temporal weapon but this is a red herring solution.
We use the weapon on Iconia, wiping out the Iconians after maybe doing some timeline analysis. This results in an altered timeline that at first glimpse might seem okay aside from wiping out one TNG episode, one DS9 episode, and probably the Vaadwaur episode of Voyager. Much of the timeline SHOULD still be intact.
The timeline as we know it MIGHT be mostly intact. However, there are two variables we can't account for our characters' present knowledge. The first and obvious one is who "The Other" is because wiping out Iconia probably wipes out "The Other" and "The Other" might be important to our history. Or might not. The history is PROBABLY somewhat recognizable. Spock might even be back. Which brings us to the main point: The bigger, immediate issue is that it brings back Romulus, which sounds nice but might not be so nice in practice. Romulus had a tumultuous history pre-Hobus. They were on the verge of unlocking a LOT about Borg technology at The Vault.
Again, I'm using story-thinking, not in-universe thinking.
I think we use the Krenim weapon on the Iconians and it results in a history with big, important gaps in it and probably a new Borg-Romulan Collective on the rampage in a galaxy diminished for loss of The Other, with Romulus intact but with its return proving that its destruction was necessary. We can't assume that had Romulus not been destroyed that it would still be like the TNG era Romulus. Things might have gotten worse and the culture might have changed due to their Borg research.
We set the timeline right after a crazy "Year of Hell" mission that pits us against a revived Romulan Star Empire that even Tal Shiar loyalist players would find unappealing. Maybe we get help from Captain Walker of the 29th century.
So that leaves us with a big question mark about The Other. I think we'll then realize that since we can't just use time tech to wipe out the Iconians the easy way, we can use it to LEARN about them and identify The Other. We go back in time either to Mol'rihan or the Dyson Sphere in the ancient past (maybe both) and -- this is key -- we learn who The Other is and see what the Iconians were like before they became dark.
Then, with our KNOWLEDGE of The Other, we track them down present day and seek their aid. The Other saved the Iconians before. Now we must seek The Other's aid or learn about The Other.
We marshal our forces and defeat the Iconians with The Other's assistance. However, issues remain with the Krenim (who might take advantage of our efforts to restore part of their empire) and The Other (who may not be friendly).
I lean towards The Other being the Hurq, which gives us a new Klingon-centric Gamma Quadrant meta-plot.
Damn skippy. If they wanna come get some too, we'll let 'em have it.
http://en.memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/0#0
It's a stretch, but still a possibility. I do like the possibility of the Fek'lhr being a tie-in, too, but it still leaves the question of who's holding the reigns regarding the Fek'lhr in the first place. It's still possible they're some entity/race's versions of Heralds & so forth, too.
Actually my general point is your quote is ultimately meaningless as it's very evident that STO ignores most of the material from the novelverse. Occasionally they'll incorporate things that they like like they did with the Romulans but ultimately most material from the books is irrelevant. It's soft canon to be ignored or heeded at a whim.
The travellers race(?) is a possibility but would more than likely bring up Wesley and Will Wheaton has expressed that he doesn't want to play the character again.
Right now in my mind are time travel shenanigans result in it being us as the other, or the Sphere Builders, either way it's going to either something of immense power, or something we never saw coming.
Hurq are a Gamma Quadrant bad guy. There are hints dropping (including Sela working with the Dominion now) that the Gamma Quadrant is next. Hurq positions the Klingons for updates and to take center stage for awhile and there are some general Klingon updates in the pipeline, including character model improvements. Hurq are out of left field enough to set us up for several years of new plots and I don't think the Iconians will be taken out without setting up new meta-plots for the game.
I also think that since my inclination is towards a Krenim/Year of Heck episode in the near future where we muck up the timeline, the identity of The Other needs to be something that would muck up the timeline but not immediately reveal the identity of The Other, which I think they will make its own episode.
If the Hurq are an Iconian splinter group, the thing to look for in a Year of Heck episode would be what that does to Klingons. Klingons developed early spaceflight by taking the Hurq's ships. If we wipe out the Iconians and the Hurq are Iconians, the Klingon Empire as we know it would cease to exist. They would likely be pre-Warp, less advanced, or (my guess) largely conquered by the Romulans with Klingon refugees as Federation citizens.
My strong leaning is that if we're getting an episode about why time travel is an imperfect solution (and I think that's where this is headed), the key is to show that a world where Romulus is NOT destroyed is a world where Federation, Klingons, and Romulans are all worse off for the survival of the homeworld. That even the most loyal person to the Empire would sacrifice Romulus again rather than accept what the planet would have become. That likely equates to a ruined Klingon Empire, a Federation on the ropes, and a Romulan Empire with an intact homeworld but which honors Romulan values even less than D'Tan's Republic.
I lean towards the idea of something like Sela or Donatra as a Romulan Collective Queen who has completely stripped almost every Romulan of their free will and converted them into drones. Having mastered the Borg technology (or succumbed to it), the post-Nemesis Romulans in the "dark" timeline might be worse than the original Borg Collective.Looking back, I think what we're building to has to be the reveal that the destruction of the homeworld and fall of the empire was a mercy to Romulans, who are better off. And, in the end, we may have something like Taris making the call that Romulus must die again and that the deaths of everyone in the Hobus event are a worthwhile and tactical sacrifice that must be made. In a way, there could be nothing MORE Romulan than condemning your homeworld to death again for the greater good. That's what Romulans DO. They embrace uncomfortable, amoral sacrifices.
Now who this Founder is and why s/he helped the Iconians is a huge question. But one thing's for sure, The Preservers and the Founders were one of the original galactic powers in the Milky Way Galaxy.
The Preservers dominated both the Alpha and Beta Quadrants.
The Founders dominated the Gamma Quadrant.
And the mysterious species who originally controlled the "Underspace" in the Delta Quadrant.
-- at least that's how I view it currently.
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"Someone should do a story where a Horta meets a Vorta. And then they find a portal to Vorta-Vor and become immortal. Sorta." ~Christopher L. Bennett
Uh. That "greater good" routine is a Vulcan (specifically, a Surakian) thing: "Spunau bolayalar t'Wehku bolayalar t'Zamu il t'Veh." (That's Golic Vulcan for "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one." -- a quote from Surak) D'Tan and other Surakians in Republic society are probably quite fond of this dictum (the legend at the bottom of the memorial to Spahkh supplies at least some evidence for that), but that doesn't mean that this perspective is universal among Romulans.
Also, referring to it as "amoral" seems off. I'm no fan of Mill's Utilitarianism (or any other Consequentialist Ethic, for that matter), but there's a whole segment of ethical philosophers in the real world (as well as, apparently, Surak in the Trek universe) who would argue that such a sacrifice would be ethically praiseworthy.
The scenario you present, however, is an interesting one, value judgments aside.
As for the question of "The Other," ...
One of my fleetmates (Rexyf) pointed out that the faction symbol for the Devidians is the same as the Dyson Rep symbol and FX seen in the spheres:
I then made an observation about a similarity of appearance between the ancient Dewans
and the Devidians
(This isn't about the obvious texture similarities; the video file found at the Gateway under ch'Mol'Rihan was corrupt, and that may not represent an accurate presentation of the Dewan skin. Instead, look at the shape of the heads.) The Devidians look emaciated, while the Dewans appear to be well-fed. The Devidians seem to be rather hungry, insisting "We must feed!"
Then I commented on the fairly common shift in language from a w to a v and vice-versa (Proto-Germanic w was pronounced like modern English w, but in modern German is pronounced like modern English v; Classical Latin v was pronounced like modern English w, but shifted to a modern English v sound sometime during the Mediaeval period after the rise of Old Italian). This is relevant depending on the stem from which both Dewan (given as DiWahn in other sources) and Devidian derive. The original stem of either (or, I would argue, of both) could be something like *dewi-, *dewa-, *deva-, or *devi-, and that would provide some linguistic evidence to add to the "heraldic" evidence and the osteological evidence (specifically the skull shape).
So a little background might be in order:
http://sto.gamepedia.com/Dewan
http://sto.gamepedia.com/Devidian