Predestination is a great thing, and it was obvious that Kragan had petty much figured it all out by some of his comments. The ending fit in quite well with the predestination paradox problem, and tied right in with the ideals of the Federation.....and with my Fed players moral compass.
That being said, I played the mission the second time around with my Romulan, who is steaming mad about her planet being destroyed, is more of a revenge seeking warmonger and allied with the Klingons and wanted nothing more than to wipe the Iconians out. After selecting all the choices matching her attitude (choices available throughout the mission), suddenly at the end, with NO explanation, she just stands idly by when all she wanted to do was join Sela in killing the last Iconians and would have gladly disintegrated Kagran also if need be to achieve that end.
At the very least they could have written in her being held in some kind of stasis field/knocked unconscious/knocked off the platform and couldn't get back in time ..... something, anything to explain why she didn't wipe the last Iconians out. Instead, she returns home, being hailed as a hero for ending the war, and will spend the rest of her life wondering if maybe the Men in Black snuck in and used a neural neutralizer on her, wiping her memory of the exact event(s) that led to her not killing the Iconians (who she still hates with every fiber of her being) when she had the chance........
I might have liked it if there were more options available as to how it all ended, including joining Sela, if only for a while in the shooting. None of my characters however would do anything of the sort, unless I decide to roll a mirror Terran Fed.
Every time someone complains about something that's different from straightforward murder murder kill kill death, I want to punch them.
This is why the only way i can play this game is solo and with all social options turned off. The ending was pure Trek and these guys are mad they didn't get to kill everything in their one hit dps ships. Most of the blame has to go on Cryptic for letting a Star Trek game turn into a kill everything shooter. Proves that most of the people playing this game don't give a TRIBBLE about what Star Trek is about. They just want their pew pew pew.
My Starfleet character swore an oath to uphold the ideals of the Federation, killing defenceless people goes against that oath even if they will be at war with you in 200k years.
I always stick the moral high ground in Midnight
"The meaning of victory is not to merely defeat your enemy but to destroy him, to completely eradicate him from living memory, to leave no remnant of his endeavours, to crush utterly his achievement and remove from all record his every trace of existence. From that defeat no enemy can ever recover. That is the meaning of victory."
-Lord Commander Solar Macharius
Romulus being restored is about the only thing that couldn't happen as I doubt CBS/Paramount would allow them to do that, considering how important that event is to the creation of the new Trek timeline. We may not like it, but people are going to have to live with it as I see no chance of that ever being changed.
Logic is the beginning of wisdom, not the end of it.
Romulus being restored is about the only thing that couldn't happen as I doubt CBS/Paramount would allow them to do that, considering how important that event is to the creation of the new Trek timeline. We may not like it, but people are going to have to live with it as I see no chance of that ever being changed.
It would also require writing 30 missions or so completely to account for a timeline where Romulus was not destroyed. Or maintaining 2 different sector spaces, making New Romulus unavailable...
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
Every time someone complains about something that's different from straightforward murder murder kill kill death, I want to punch them.
This is why the only way i can play this game is solo and with all social options turned off. The ending was pure Trek and these guys are mad they didn't get to kill everything in their one hit dps ships. Most of the blame has to go on Cryptic for letting a Star Trek game turn into a kill everything shooter. Proves that most of the people playing this game don't give a TRIBBLE about what Star Trek is about. They just want their pew pew pew.
Don't get me wrong the whole, S6 war, S7 war, S8 war, so on an so on is really wearing thin. However these guys wanted to destroy everything, they have already killed everything and everyone. Negotiating with someone like this is nigh impossible, It would be like trying to negotiate a peace treaty with Hitler on Meth.
I find it weak cryptic came out with that ending. 10 seasons of war and constant blasting away of enemy ships and ground troops to be settled with a blue Xmas ball ball. You kind of would say to then, oh by the way don't forget the most important thing in your entire history. Could of used the Krenim device to send the Iconians and heralds into there own dimension. That would of been interesting. Going back in time was something that weapon was never, ever designed to do.
Romulus being restored is about the only thing that couldn't happen as I doubt CBS/Paramount would allow them to do that, considering how important that event is to the creation of the new Trek timeline. We may not like it, but people are going to have to live with it as I see no chance of that ever being changed.
And if you were paramount would you be happy with some of the things happening in Star trek online?
Paramount doesn't own the license for TV-Trek and novels and games connected to TV-Trek.
CBS does, and pretty much everything that Cryptic does here has to be run by CBS first.
In short: If you played it, CBS said yes to it at some point.
Romulus being restored is about the only thing that couldn't happen as I doubt CBS/Paramount would allow them to do that, considering how important that event is to the creation of the new Trek timeline. We may not like it, but people are going to have to live with it as I see no chance of that ever being changed.
And if you were paramount would you be happy with some of the things happening in Star trek online?
Paramount doesn't own the license for TV-Trek and novels and games connected to TV-Trek.
CBS does, and pretty much everything that Cryptic does here has to be run by CBS first.
In short: If you played it, CBS said yes to it at some point.
Paramount only owns the movie rights these days.
Well I'm not Paramount and I know they only own the rights to the movies. Problem is that nu!trek is, so far, only movies and they depend on Romulus' destruction. Which I assume CBS okayed at some point as it would affect any new TV-series they made. So both must have agreed on this happening at some point.
But yes, as Paramount I would care as it would make the new franchise I had invested heavily possibly defunct. Yes STO isn't canon so it might not, but it might give CBS ideas of officially bringing Romulus back thus erasing the timeline I had created. Plus CBS tries to keep most things close to canon, such when planets go Alderaan they don't just magically appear again.
As for CBS, I have no idea. If they bring Romulus back. Or rather as was the intent in the Iconian mission, prevent it from ever being destroyed, then nu!Trek never happened. So they could continue Star Trek where Voyager left off, which is what a lot of Trek fans have asked for. On the other hand, they might be tempted to use the new universe instead, in which case Romulus must be destroyed and it can't happen in game.
See, this is why I hate time travel. It never makes any sense and you need events of the future to line up so they can affect the past in the way it has to be affected for the future to happen. (Predestination paradox). Or you create alternate universes where I just ask why we could have had a whole different storyline without the whole time travel nonsense to start with.
tl;dr I don't see it happening as CBS would have to okay it and, since this would possibly affect Paramount's new universe too, they might have to get an okay from them as well. Also, I hate time travel. Temporal investigations must love me.
Edit: Apart from the above. After the Iconian arc I really, really don't see it happening in game as the whole story line depends on Romulus' destruction. 1) Romulus is destroyed by the Icnonians making Sela vengeful towards them, 2) we go back in time to stop the Iconians fleeing, 3) Sela tries to destroy the Iconians pissing off T'Ket, 4) T'Ket takes revenge by blowing up Romulus thereby closing the circle. (Did I mention I hate time travel?)
So it would take massive rewriting of basically the entire history for the game for this to happen, everything that happened right from the start depended on Romulus going Alderaan. Personally I very much doubt Cryptic is willing to spend the time and resources needed to do that.
Logic is the beginning of wisdom, not the end of it.
wow ...STO community kinda jaded....ya all know- most games dont carry the storyline at all...at least STO is trying...they surely wont please everyone
Way too "contrived" to make the universe "look" like it did post-war as it did pre-war.
Honestly, here's my character's "take" on the issue:
Between 2 Liberated Borg who had access to the Collective's time travel tech used in First Contact
Android, Photonic Engie, 3x Trill, Vulcan, and other assorted BOffs for heavy-duty mathematical lifting if the computers weren't capable
Drake's and "historical" records of the / calculations necessary to reproduce the "slingshot effect"
Foreknowledge that the Iconians went to Dewa III, and the Astrometrics computers / to figure out exactly where I'd have to go
"wickedly advanced" Starships for the era (what, 197,590 BC or so?)
Holodeck(s) that could calculate the "precise" point of returning the World Heart for "minimal disruption" of the timeline but with maximum saved lives "if I absolutely had to placate Temporal Instigations that badly"
Heck, Temporal Instigations department that would "assist" me in however many do-overs that were necessary to reach "their" tipping point...
Etc. etc.
I could have, should have, and would have "prevented as much war as possible".
Detecting big-time "anti-old-school" bias here. NX? Lobi. TOS/TMP Connie? Super-promotion-box. (aka the two hardest ways to get ships) Excelsior & all 3 TNG "big hero" ships? C-Store. Please Equalize...
To rob a line: [quote: Mariemaia Kushrenada] Forum Posting is much like an endless waltz. The three beats of war, peace and revolution continue on forever. However, opinions will change upon the reading of my post.[/quote]
An interesting question would be - what happened to species like the Icobar? Did they murder each other eventually? It seems unlikely it was the Iconians.
I've been thinking about just that while running this so many times over so many weeks. We know that the Iconians, despite the relatively peaceful portrayal that we see in Midnight, did have those probes that scrambled computers of ships in orbit, and that they were still active 200,000 years later. We know that the Yamato lasted quite some time after being infected. So perhaps many, or even most of the armada that bombarded Iconia were infected, some being destroyed right in the system, others being destroyed on the journey home, but some making it all the way back home and spreading the infection to their home systems, eventually causing the collapse of those civilizations. Maybe the Iconians, albeit indirectly, did get their revenge on those species after all.
As far as this not being like Trek? Hogwash. Trek is full of contrived solutions, and the results of this war are pure Trek. Two very advanced species from ages ago are reintroduced. One of them ends up dead by the others' hands, and that other retreats to its old homeworld saying, "Come back to see us in a thousand or so years when you've grown up a bit." That's very much like what happens in most Trek stories where they meet a species that's more advanced.
Changing the past by eliminating the Iconian survivors, thus preventing any war is against the ideals of the Federation, for certain. Playing that to a Klingon or Romulan sensibility is tougher, but the end result has to be the same for everyone, otherwise the story is just a mess. Aside from that, it would mean re-writing just about the whole game, and that simply wasn't ever on the table. There's also a bit of a canon problem with the servitors if you kill off the Iconians. The Elachi had contact with an Earth ship before there even was a Federation, the Bluegills were a major plot point in the back half of season 1 of TNG, and the Solanae run into the 1701-D a few years later. All of that, and anything it touched, likely goes if the Iconians are all killed 200,000 years ago.
This storyline, including the ending, were far from perfect, mind you. M'Tara fought the player character up close and personal six times (!) during Broken Circle, and never once noticed that said character looked an awful lot like that alien that they all speak so reverently of? Bluegills were created by the Solanae on the Iconians' orders, and infiltrated Starfleet on their behalf roughly six months prior to the discovery of Iconia, yet preventing that discovery somehow means they don't come back so soon? There are more, I'm sure, but those two stick out to me at the moment.
This is an MMO, not a Star Trek episode simulator. That would make for a terrible game.
Comments
That being said, I played the mission the second time around with my Romulan, who is steaming mad about her planet being destroyed, is more of a revenge seeking warmonger and allied with the Klingons and wanted nothing more than to wipe the Iconians out. After selecting all the choices matching her attitude (choices available throughout the mission), suddenly at the end, with NO explanation, she just stands idly by when all she wanted to do was join Sela in killing the last Iconians and would have gladly disintegrated Kagran also if need be to achieve that end.
At the very least they could have written in her being held in some kind of stasis field/knocked unconscious/knocked off the platform and couldn't get back in time ..... something, anything to explain why she didn't wipe the last Iconians out. Instead, she returns home, being hailed as a hero for ending the war, and will spend the rest of her life wondering if maybe the Men in Black snuck in and used a neural neutralizer on her, wiping her memory of the exact event(s) that led to her not killing the Iconians (who she still hates with every fiber of her being) when she had the chance........
Have Loriss from Dominion FE be the background Vorta on "Sela's" ship.
Make us move out of earshot before Sela goes on about offing everyone.
Some of the console decor could have random info to read or load to tricorder.
The Iconian surface under the floating platforms should look more ruined. (for anyone who bothers to look down)
We see non-holographic Dewans on the other side of the final gate.
Ancient L'miren finding that she was crippled just before T'ket picks her up.
The "spare the Iconians" Player backs up Kagren against Sela.
Give Kagren a Klingon bridge.
Have Sela with SF or RR security guards flanking her at the Academy.
I always stick the moral high ground in Midnight
-Lord Commander Solar Macharius
Don't get me wrong the whole, S6 war, S7 war, S8 war, so on an so on is really wearing thin. However these guys wanted to destroy everything, they have already killed everything and everyone. Negotiating with someone like this is nigh impossible, It would be like trying to negotiate a peace treaty with Hitler on Meth.
I find it weak cryptic came out with that ending. 10 seasons of war and constant blasting away of enemy ships and ground troops to be settled with a blue Xmas ball ball. You kind of would say to then, oh by the way don't forget the most important thing in your entire history. Could of used the Krenim device to send the Iconians and heralds into there own dimension. That would of been interesting. Going back in time was something that weapon was never, ever designed to do.
And if you were paramount would you be happy with some of the things happening in Star trek online?
CBS does, and pretty much everything that Cryptic does here has to be run by CBS first.
In short: If you played it, CBS said yes to it at some point.
Paramount only owns the movie rights these days.
Well I'm not Paramount and I know they only own the rights to the movies. Problem is that nu!trek is, so far, only movies and they depend on Romulus' destruction. Which I assume CBS okayed at some point as it would affect any new TV-series they made. So both must have agreed on this happening at some point.
But yes, as Paramount I would care as it would make the new franchise I had invested heavily possibly defunct. Yes STO isn't canon so it might not, but it might give CBS ideas of officially bringing Romulus back thus erasing the timeline I had created. Plus CBS tries to keep most things close to canon, such when planets go Alderaan they don't just magically appear again.
As for CBS, I have no idea. If they bring Romulus back. Or rather as was the intent in the Iconian mission, prevent it from ever being destroyed, then nu!Trek never happened. So they could continue Star Trek where Voyager left off, which is what a lot of Trek fans have asked for. On the other hand, they might be tempted to use the new universe instead, in which case Romulus must be destroyed and it can't happen in game.
See, this is why I hate time travel. It never makes any sense and you need events of the future to line up so they can affect the past in the way it has to be affected for the future to happen. (Predestination paradox). Or you create alternate universes where I just ask why we could have had a whole different storyline without the whole time travel nonsense to start with.
tl;dr I don't see it happening as CBS would have to okay it and, since this would possibly affect Paramount's new universe too, they might have to get an okay from them as well. Also, I hate time travel. Temporal investigations must love me.
Edit: Apart from the above. After the Iconian arc I really, really don't see it happening in game as the whole story line depends on Romulus' destruction. 1) Romulus is destroyed by the Icnonians making Sela vengeful towards them, 2) we go back in time to stop the Iconians fleeing, 3) Sela tries to destroy the Iconians pissing off T'Ket, 4) T'Ket takes revenge by blowing up Romulus thereby closing the circle. (Did I mention I hate time travel?)
So it would take massive rewriting of basically the entire history for the game for this to happen, everything that happened right from the start depended on Romulus going Alderaan. Personally I very much doubt Cryptic is willing to spend the time and resources needed to do that.
Way too "contrived" to make the universe "look" like it did post-war as it did pre-war.
Honestly, here's my character's "take" on the issue:
Between 2 Liberated Borg who had access to the Collective's time travel tech used in First Contact
Android, Photonic Engie, 3x Trill, Vulcan, and other assorted BOffs for heavy-duty mathematical lifting if the computers weren't capable
Drake's and "historical" records of the / calculations necessary to reproduce the "slingshot effect"
Foreknowledge that the Iconians went to Dewa III, and the Astrometrics computers / to figure out exactly where I'd have to go
"wickedly advanced" Starships for the era (what, 197,590 BC or so?)
Holodeck(s) that could calculate the "precise" point of returning the World Heart for "minimal disruption" of the timeline but with maximum saved lives "if I absolutely had to placate Temporal Instigations that badly"
Heck, Temporal Instigations department that would "assist" me in however many do-overs that were necessary to reach "their" tipping point...
Etc. etc.
I could have, should have, and would have "prevented as much war as possible".
To rob a line: [quote: Mariemaia Kushrenada] Forum Posting is much like an endless waltz. The three beats of war, peace and revolution continue on forever. However, opinions will change upon the reading of my post.[/quote]
I've been thinking about just that while running this so many times over so many weeks. We know that the Iconians, despite the relatively peaceful portrayal that we see in Midnight, did have those probes that scrambled computers of ships in orbit, and that they were still active 200,000 years later. We know that the Yamato lasted quite some time after being infected. So perhaps many, or even most of the armada that bombarded Iconia were infected, some being destroyed right in the system, others being destroyed on the journey home, but some making it all the way back home and spreading the infection to their home systems, eventually causing the collapse of those civilizations. Maybe the Iconians, albeit indirectly, did get their revenge on those species after all.
As far as this not being like Trek? Hogwash. Trek is full of contrived solutions, and the results of this war are pure Trek. Two very advanced species from ages ago are reintroduced. One of them ends up dead by the others' hands, and that other retreats to its old homeworld saying, "Come back to see us in a thousand or so years when you've grown up a bit." That's very much like what happens in most Trek stories where they meet a species that's more advanced.
Changing the past by eliminating the Iconian survivors, thus preventing any war is against the ideals of the Federation, for certain. Playing that to a Klingon or Romulan sensibility is tougher, but the end result has to be the same for everyone, otherwise the story is just a mess. Aside from that, it would mean re-writing just about the whole game, and that simply wasn't ever on the table. There's also a bit of a canon problem with the servitors if you kill off the Iconians. The Elachi had contact with an Earth ship before there even was a Federation, the Bluegills were a major plot point in the back half of season 1 of TNG, and the Solanae run into the 1701-D a few years later. All of that, and anything it touched, likely goes if the Iconians are all killed 200,000 years ago.
This storyline, including the ending, were far from perfect, mind you. M'Tara fought the player character up close and personal six times (!) during Broken Circle, and never once noticed that said character looked an awful lot like that alien that they all speak so reverently of? Bluegills were created by the Solanae on the Iconians' orders, and infiltrated Starfleet on their behalf roughly six months prior to the discovery of Iconia, yet preventing that discovery somehow means they don't come back so soon? There are more, I'm sure, but those two stick out to me at the moment.