You know, with Janeway coming into play, I'm starting to think she'll suggest to go back in time a few months earlier.
Think about it, the STO timeline has a lot of similarity with the various possible future timelines featured in various Star Trek series.
-We have a working Dauntless which was presumed to be a prototype in Voyager
-We have the Galaxy-X Dreadnought from All Good Things
-We have Miral Paris looking and acting more or less like the VOY Endgame version
-We have the USS Rhode Island from Endgame
-"Old" Naomi and Icheb
-Alexander inverting the outcome of DS9 Firstborn
-Nog is a Captain
Also, apparently, the Nexus is set to come back in 2410.
So one of my hypotheses is this, especially considering what Nog says about the Iconians (that their minds adapt to the timeline they end up into):
-during the final mission of the Iconian War, Janeway convinces the player and a group of heroes/scientists to go back in time just after the Iconian sphere arrives in the Milky Way.
Using any time-traveling tech they can get (maybe the Guardian of Forever or even the Nexus), the player shoves the whole sphere and its inhabitants through time right before the destruction of Iconia. The Iconians gain their past memories, making them good again (therefore fulfilling what the Prophet said about the Other saving them again) and you get to learn more about them, maybe even befriending them.
Unfortunately, you also have to make sure M'Tara, L'Miren, T'Ket and the rest of the council survive to keep the time loop stable and not cause your timeline to stop existing again, so you save them in a way but they presume you sacrificed yourself in the bombardment (while you, in fact go back to your time) and they remember you as the Other.
This way, all happens just like before except a new timeline begins where the Iconian alliance suffers no severe casualties (and maybe the preservers are still alive).
But there would be the problem of the Krenim (since they have to be your allies due to the fleet holding, Doffs and Boffs), unless your group was careful enough to keep a temporal-shielded data core and inform the alliance of the existence of the Krenim to go tell them you "defeated" the Iconians and start working with them to rebuild their civilization along with the others devastated over all the years.
Okay let's brainstorm it, and say we divert that "staging sphere" (as Sela called it in Uneasy Allies) that jumps back to Iconia from Andromeda and send it back to 200,000 years ago.
Let's assume that this sphere brought everything (well, most, at least) that we worry so much about, and no other spheres or Heralds have been mobilized.
^That may not entirely be true because the Alliance attacks several spheres in an attempt to knock out the gateway network (mentioned in Broken Circle).
Anyway:
The present would get rid of the sphere and the Herald armada that sphere contains, true, so even if we don't remove the threat entirely, it would definitely cut into their powerbase.
But the past will have +1 Iconian sphere. Where would that sphere go? Wouldn't those unexpected reinforcements stop the "Bombardment of Iconia" or cause some kind of trouble for us? Wouldn't we end up with a present where the Iconians still rule?
As for Iconians referring to us as the "Other"...
Here's a theory:
With the Krenim weapon:
After we fire it we require temporal shielding to observe the result, and if we like it, then dropping those shields allow us to reintegrate into the changed timeline. Doing so re-shapes our memories [like what happens to Iconian minds during time travel] and our computer records to fit the new scenario and we need a temporally shielded data storage medium to later figure out what changed.
With time travel:
In our case, we retain our memories from our point of origin. In the case of the Iconians, their memories change to fit the scenario (like ours do during "timeline reintegration"). However, in this case both our technologies still retain records of our point of origin.
Even if Iconians and Heralds lose their memory after time travel, they'd still have all the data they collected in their ships and the sphere. And I think they've went an extra mile to know what they were fighting exactly. Remember they have agents everywhere and extensive intel on every major player in the galactic landscape.
So even if they do lose their memories, they can still figure things out from the records retained by their systems (like we do using the shielded core in the Krenim weapon's case).
// Is it just me, or the whole thing (with time travel and the Iconians + time alteration and us) does have a yin-and-yang ring to it? O.o
And I don't think they'd regard us with an... almost reverence-like attitude like they do with the Other. They'd see a war with a Federation that is not even born yet, and in that knowledge, with a 200,000 year head start, I believe they would take steps to make sure that the political landscape never gives rise to the Delta Alliance.
L'Miren would once again probably take the sanity-ball and vote against obliterating our homeworlds, but they'd have a list of mistakes they could learn from, people to target, events and affairs to interfere with. What if they antagonize the Undine earlier? Like say... in Archer's era? Or even earlier?
So I think sending that sphere back would not solve the problem. It would only strengthen the Iconians in the past, as well as hasten and/or ensure their victory.
In our attempt to get rid of something in the present, we would introduce a new variable in our past that would change our history - and I think it would take a turn for the worse.
Sorry for the long post ^^'''
"Ad astra audacter eamus in alis fidelium."
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
The present would get rid of the sphere and the Herald armada that sphere contains, true, so even if we don't remove the threat entirely, it would definitely cut into their powerbase.
But the past will have +1 Iconian sphere. Where would that sphere go? Wouldn't those unexpected reinforcements stop the "Bombardment of Iconia" or cause some kind of trouble for us? Wouldn't we end up with a present where the Iconians still rule?
Or it could be another pogo paradox: Why do the Iconians have this Sphere (which Sela mentioned was way older than the others)? Because it was sent back in time, which then causes another stable time loop with the sphere being refilled in herald ships for 200 000 years before being sent back for another 200 millenia after losing a few millions of its ships.
As for where the Sphere would come from in the first place, like all time-travel stories which involves this kind of scenario: OH LOOK, A CUDDLY FRIENDLY EPOHN HERE!
Since we know the Iconians were in the Andromeda galaxy. Do you think, when they were dominating the Milky Way, they also spread out in the Andromeda galaxy? Or did they just hide in the Andromeda sphere? Also, if they are other warp cable or more advanced species, do you think they know about them? Will we ever explore the Andromeda galaxy?
Since we know the Iconians were in the Andromeda galaxy. Do you think, when they were dominating the Milky Way, they also spread out in the Andromeda galaxy? Or did they just hide in the Andromeda sphere? Also, if they are other warp cable or more advanced species, do you think they know about them? Will we ever explore the Andromeda galaxy?
At least it opens some doors to going extragalactic. Most likely after more of Milky Way's explored, though we'll probably get a chance to get a sneak peak before we do.
-Tasha Yar from the alternate timeline would still be alive because Sela didn't give off the alarm. More than likely she would have escaped anyway and returned to the Feds.
-Taris would have no reason to turn to the Iconians to gain the power necessary to overthrow Sela, and thereby cause the destruction of Romulus. Although there is the side chance of Hakeev coming to power and overthrowing her, thereby renewing her lust for more power.
-The Romulan Republic would not be formed as it was, however, as Butterfly suggested, the Unification movement would have grown so strong that D'Tan would have still formed it in some shape or form with Fed or Klink assistance.
-There is also the side chance of either Obisek or D'Tan overthrowing the Empire and forming the Republic in their image with Romulus as its center.
-Then again, this could also mean that Donatra would not have been assimilated by the Borg and would have taken power of the Empire, with D'Tan as a mediator. The renewed Borg threat at the Romulan border and its impact on the Federation might have pressured a now split empire to form the Typhon Pact...wait...wrong timeline...
-Romulans, in all of their secrecy, are pretty smart when it comes to certain things. If the Undine infiltrated the Gorn Hegemony as planned when the Iconians provoked them, the Romulan Star Empire would have been the first to know about it. If they're still in alliance mode in a post-Dominion War era, they would have notified the Federation how stupid it would have been to assume the Klingons were lying, and that by ignoring them it would fuel J'mpok's desire to back out of the Khitomer Accords. Or...you know, sit back and watch the fireworks from afar.
-At the height of our combined power, free from the distraction that was Hobus, we would have been in a better position to engage the Iconians.
I also noticed that Sela keeps sending messages even after the events of Uneasy Allies. Apparently the Dominion wants no part in the war. Which means that her venture through the Wormhole was meaningless and thereby alleviating even more damage if she was removed from time.
Yeah I'm itchiiiing to find out what Sela is doing. Her messages suggest that she is trying to bring an alliance together, comprised of interstellar powers that would never sit down with the Delta Alliance at the same table.
Either she
returns, with an epic cavalry following
leans back in her chair, gambles that the Alliance will defeat / push back the Iconians on its own, and then makes her move against us while we are weakened
ooor she totally fails and nothing comes out of her efforts at all XD
Which one is more likely?
Other ideas?
Are the Alliance powers expecting her back?
"Ad astra audacter eamus in alis fidelium."
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
It's actually sad that our greatest enemy of the past century would be the only hope we have at removing the Iconian threat. The same would be said for the Romulans had they not joined us in relinquishing the Dominion from the Alpha and Beta quads.
Even after 30 years, the Dominion still remains the most powerful faction in the galaxy. We neither caught up or fell behind. The Female Changeling remained true to her word at the end of DS9 when she said we wouldn't prove to be a threat to them for a long time.
We returned the Female Changeling to them. That could be our bargaining chip. However, by rendering the Treaty of Bajor moot the Dominion could literally conquer us all in our weakened states (but of course, the plot won't allow for that and they will choose to respect the terms of the treaty). In good Star Trek fashion, this could open new diplomatic ties between the Alliance and the Dominion. Hopefully that will mean some Gamma Quadrant exploration. Perhaps that's where Season 11 is based? (Or perhaps we're simply rounding off our portion of the galaxy)
Well if the Dominion do decide to help the Alliance, it will be good to see Odo again. Since the Female Changeling is back with her people, Odo could go back to DS9.
I wonder if one of the projects that Admiral Janeway's working on has something to do with the device that future Janeway used to travel back in time in the finale of Star Trek: Voyager? I can see something of a larger version being used as a modification of the character's ship in the final episode of the Iconian War.
Then again, I've been known to be wrong, every now and then.
I think a new dominion war would be problematic because it invalidates the presence of Odo in the Great Link. He should be the tempering force that convinces the Dominion to change.
That would need to be adressed in the story in some way, and without Odo or Rene Auberjonois, this would seem to fall flat. Of course, if they can get him...
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
Comments
No he erased a Zahl colony and then the whole species. It was more than just one city.
Think about it, the STO timeline has a lot of similarity with the various possible future timelines featured in various Star Trek series.
-We have a working Dauntless which was presumed to be a prototype in Voyager
-We have the Galaxy-X Dreadnought from All Good Things
-We have Miral Paris looking and acting more or less like the VOY Endgame version
-We have the USS Rhode Island from Endgame
-"Old" Naomi and Icheb
-Alexander inverting the outcome of DS9 Firstborn
-Nog is a Captain
Also, apparently, the Nexus is set to come back in 2410.
So one of my hypotheses is this, especially considering what Nog says about the Iconians (that their minds adapt to the timeline they end up into):
-during the final mission of the Iconian War, Janeway convinces the player and a group of heroes/scientists to go back in time just after the Iconian sphere arrives in the Milky Way.
Using any time-traveling tech they can get (maybe the Guardian of Forever or even the Nexus), the player shoves the whole sphere and its inhabitants through time right before the destruction of Iconia. The Iconians gain their past memories, making them good again (therefore fulfilling what the Prophet said about the Other saving them again) and you get to learn more about them, maybe even befriending them.
Unfortunately, you also have to make sure M'Tara, L'Miren, T'Ket and the rest of the council survive to keep the time loop stable and not cause your timeline to stop existing again, so you save them in a way but they presume you sacrificed yourself in the bombardment (while you, in fact go back to your time) and they remember you as the Other.
This way, all happens just like before except a new timeline begins where the Iconian alliance suffers no severe casualties (and maybe the preservers are still alive).
But there would be the problem of the Krenim (since they have to be your allies due to the fleet holding, Doffs and Boffs), unless your group was careful enough to keep a temporal-shielded data core and inform the alliance of the existence of the Krenim to go tell them you "defeated" the Iconians and start working with them to rebuild their civilization along with the others devastated over all the years.
Okay let's brainstorm it, and say we divert that "staging sphere" (as Sela called it in Uneasy Allies) that jumps back to Iconia from Andromeda and send it back to 200,000 years ago.
Let's assume that this sphere brought everything (well, most, at least) that we worry so much about, and no other spheres or Heralds have been mobilized.
^That may not entirely be true because the Alliance attacks several spheres in an attempt to knock out the gateway network (mentioned in Broken Circle).
Anyway:
The present would get rid of the sphere and the Herald armada that sphere contains, true, so even if we don't remove the threat entirely, it would definitely cut into their powerbase.
But the past will have +1 Iconian sphere. Where would that sphere go? Wouldn't those unexpected reinforcements stop the "Bombardment of Iconia" or cause some kind of trouble for us? Wouldn't we end up with a present where the Iconians still rule?
As for Iconians referring to us as the "Other"...
Here's a theory:
With the Krenim weapon:
After we fire it we require temporal shielding to observe the result, and if we like it, then dropping those shields allow us to reintegrate into the changed timeline. Doing so re-shapes our memories [like what happens to Iconian minds during time travel] and our computer records to fit the new scenario and we need a temporally shielded data storage medium to later figure out what changed.
With time travel:
In our case, we retain our memories from our point of origin. In the case of the Iconians, their memories change to fit the scenario (like ours do during "timeline reintegration"). However, in this case both our technologies still retain records of our point of origin.
Even if Iconians and Heralds lose their memory after time travel, they'd still have all the data they collected in their ships and the sphere. And I think they've went an extra mile to know what they were fighting exactly. Remember they have agents everywhere and extensive intel on every major player in the galactic landscape.
So even if they do lose their memories, they can still figure things out from the records retained by their systems (like we do using the shielded core in the Krenim weapon's case).
// Is it just me, or the whole thing (with time travel and the Iconians + time alteration and us) does have a yin-and-yang ring to it? O.o
And I don't think they'd regard us with an... almost reverence-like attitude like they do with the Other. They'd see a war with a Federation that is not even born yet, and in that knowledge, with a 200,000 year head start, I believe they would take steps to make sure that the political landscape never gives rise to the Delta Alliance.
L'Miren would once again probably take the sanity-ball and vote against obliterating our homeworlds, but they'd have a list of mistakes they could learn from, people to target, events and affairs to interfere with. What if they antagonize the Undine earlier? Like say... in Archer's era? Or even earlier?
So I think sending that sphere back would not solve the problem. It would only strengthen the Iconians in the past, as well as hasten and/or ensure their victory.
In our attempt to get rid of something in the present, we would introduce a new variable in our past that would change our history - and I think it would take a turn for the worse.
Sorry for the long post ^^'''
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
Or it could be another pogo paradox: Why do the Iconians have this Sphere (which Sela mentioned was way older than the others)? Because it was sent back in time, which then causes another stable time loop with the sphere being refilled in herald ships for 200 000 years before being sent back for another 200 millenia after losing a few millions of its ships.
As for where the Sphere would come from in the first place, like all time-travel stories which involves this kind of scenario: OH LOOK, A CUDDLY FRIENDLY EPOHN HERE!
My character Tsin'xing
At least it opens some doors to going extragalactic. Most likely after more of Milky Way's explored, though we'll probably get a chance to get a sneak peak before we do.
Remove Sela from time...now there's a thought.
-Tasha Yar from the alternate timeline would still be alive because Sela didn't give off the alarm. More than likely she would have escaped anyway and returned to the Feds.
-Taris would have no reason to turn to the Iconians to gain the power necessary to overthrow Sela, and thereby cause the destruction of Romulus. Although there is the side chance of Hakeev coming to power and overthrowing her, thereby renewing her lust for more power.
-The Romulan Republic would not be formed as it was, however, as Butterfly suggested, the Unification movement would have grown so strong that D'Tan would have still formed it in some shape or form with Fed or Klink assistance.
-There is also the side chance of either Obisek or D'Tan overthrowing the Empire and forming the Republic in their image with Romulus as its center.
-Then again, this could also mean that Donatra would not have been assimilated by the Borg and would have taken power of the Empire, with D'Tan as a mediator. The renewed Borg threat at the Romulan border and its impact on the Federation might have pressured a now split empire to form the Typhon Pact...wait...wrong timeline...
-Romulans, in all of their secrecy, are pretty smart when it comes to certain things. If the Undine infiltrated the Gorn Hegemony as planned when the Iconians provoked them, the Romulan Star Empire would have been the first to know about it. If they're still in alliance mode in a post-Dominion War era, they would have notified the Federation how stupid it would have been to assume the Klingons were lying, and that by ignoring them it would fuel J'mpok's desire to back out of the Khitomer Accords. Or...you know, sit back and watch the fireworks from afar.
-At the height of our combined power, free from the distraction that was Hobus, we would have been in a better position to engage the Iconians.
I also noticed that Sela keeps sending messages even after the events of Uneasy Allies. Apparently the Dominion wants no part in the war. Which means that her venture through the Wormhole was meaningless and thereby alleviating even more damage if she was removed from time.
Either she
Which one is more likely?
Other ideas?
Are the Alliance powers expecting her back?
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
Even after 30 years, the Dominion still remains the most powerful faction in the galaxy. We neither caught up or fell behind. The Female Changeling remained true to her word at the end of DS9 when she said we wouldn't prove to be a threat to them for a long time.
We returned the Female Changeling to them. That could be our bargaining chip. However, by rendering the Treaty of Bajor moot the Dominion could literally conquer us all in our weakened states (but of course, the plot won't allow for that and they will choose to respect the terms of the treaty). In good Star Trek fashion, this could open new diplomatic ties between the Alliance and the Dominion. Hopefully that will mean some Gamma Quadrant exploration. Perhaps that's where Season 11 is based? (Or perhaps we're simply rounding off our portion of the galaxy)
Vice Admiral Volmack ISS Thundermole
Brigadier General Jokag IKS Gorkan
Centurion Kares RRW Tomalak
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Then again, I've been known to be wrong, every now and then.
That would need to be adressed in the story in some way, and without Odo or Rene Auberjonois, this would seem to fall flat. Of course, if they can get him...