Headcanon from the warfront

caleb143

I've been busy thinking (seems to be a hobby of mine, eh?), and I had this idea that kinda sprang into more. This Idea combines parts from multiple sources and takes into account how while this is an MMORPG, this is also a game where it focuses on one person at a time (see STO's opening paragraph at http://www.arcgames.com/en/games/star-trek-online )
Bear in mind, this is going to be kind of nonsensical

So, you (player) go to places like ESD, DS9, Starbase Sierra, K-7, Drozana, Qo'Nos, Klingon (and Starfleet) Academy, etc- all the major social hubs in the game. Notice how it's always full, right? But if you go to places like the Fleet Starbases, Mines, Embassy, Spires, and Research Labs- aside from you and maybe a few other players, there's only small groups of NPCs.

What if... Before the Iconian War, those places were Just as busy as the major hubs? But the war came, and took a major toll on everyone. (see Broken Circle, and the rest of the missions from that arc for reasoning).

The reason every major hub has a lot of people is because Friends looking for other friends they haven't seen since the start of the war, bodies of the dead are being sent back home for burial, ships are in for repair, crews need to be treated for injuries, etc. But most of all, they are gathering around those hubs for defense of them, and (in light of the new season) some are being sent back out to explore.

It kind of makes sense, right? After a devastating war in which millions, if not billions dead or missing, wouldn't there be a major under-staffing on the countless bases?

rurinnfane

This would certainly lend to the idea that the Iconian War was an actual war, not the short-lived handful of engagements that it instead felt like in-game. I like it.
Also, remember the Delta Recruit event? That was a result of the casualties at the start of the war -- mass recruiting to fight the Iconian threat in more ways than one.

caleb143

True, I forgot about the Delta Rising promotion blurb

alexmakepeace

Please don't mention the Delta Recruitment's screwy back story...

Losses to the Iconian War > new recruits > said new recruits discover the Iconians are behind everything and the Iconian War begins...

caleb143

To be fair, The Recruits had to search for the stuff linking the iconians to everything because their future selves said to. Predestination paradoxes are tricky

alexmakepeace

caleb143 wrote: »

To be fair, The Recruits had to search for the stuff linking the iconians to everything because their future selves said to. Predestination paradoxes are tricky

Yeah, but if you think about it, they were specifically recruited to fight in the Iconian War before anyone knew there would be an Iconian war!

I haven't actually played my Delta Recruit past the tutorial, so I don't know the whole story... but the news articles that explained it don't make any sense at all.

turbomagnus

Short version is that based on information gained from Obisek, while going after Taris, in Fluidic Space, on New Romulus, etc... your Admiral/General, at the end of the Breen Story Arc and with help from their faction's respective time travel department (DTI for Feds, 'Temporal Intelligence' for KDF and 'Temporal Defense' for Roms), goes back to the Tutorial to warn their younger self of the Iconians' coming and, through use of the Tesseract Communicator, guides them to find samples of information and technology that would help the Milky Way forces better understand and fight the Iconians. (Which really just gives you bonus Rep Marks for the first six Reps up to Delta Alliance, but not Iconian Resistance or Terran Task Force)

Really, the only notable things a Delta Recruit unlocks are the "Temporal Insight" starship trait (damage immunity after a hull heal) and the Photonic Engineering Officer. Outside of the added cutscenes in the Tutorial and at the end of the Breen arc, and some interaction with the DTI/KTD/RTD officer at the proper hubs (ESD, First City and the Flotilla), it really has no effect on anything, so I usually just ignore the whole concept.

wombat140

From my very vague recollection, it was more that they needed a lot of recruits to deal with the sudden opening up of the Delta Quadrant and all the other stuff that resulted from all those Iconian Gates appearing. But honestly, if the Gateways themselves, and all the ominous messages we saw in "Sphere of Influence", hadn't already made Starfleet realise that the Iconians meant them no good, they'd have to have been quite dense.

OP: Very good idea Caleb, that works.

caleb143

All true, but The Delta Recruits' whole "purpose" outside of a gear up is not the main point of this thread. They were recruited because of manpower shortages and a way to get warned about the Iconian's real threat is what I think Rurinn was getting at. Regardless, after the war, there is yet another massive shortage, thus the nearly empty fleet bases, but the heavy social zones being swamped, as per the original post.

Wombat140: Thank you, sir/ma'am

alexmakepeace

caleb143 wrote: »

All true, but The Delta Recruits' whole "purpose" outside of a gear up is not the main point of this thread. They were recruited because of manpower shortages and a way to get warned about the Iconian's real threat is what I think Rurinn was getting at. Regardless, after the war, there is yet another massive shortage, thus the nearly empty fleet bases, but the heavy social zones being swamped, as per the original post.

Wombat140: Thank you, sir/ma'am

Yeah, sorry, I got a bit sidetracked.

I do concur with your idea--the Iconian war was supposed to be thig big, destructive, desperate thing, but it doesn't come across that way in game. A bit of headcanon helps. My own headcanon actually is actually a little bit like yours--Starfleet has lost so much during the war that it is desparate for personnel. That's why Captain Makepeace still holds his rank despite having disobeyed orders during the events of Midnight by sparing the Iconians.

Come to think of it, I explain away a whole lot of stuff in this game by giving Starfleet a desparate need for manpower, such as the player's meteoric rise to captaincy.

caleb143

Yeah. Rurinn and I were talking about something in conjunction to this thread (which is what got me thinking about this thread's topic), on how it was too rushed. A more realistic (yet still equally shocking) timeframe for all this to have happened would have had this game in 2427 at least, in our opinions. And that simply adds to the toll on Starfleet, the KDF, and the Republic, making the empty bases almost like a memorial to the fallen, and filled with old memories and the ghosts of the dead.

rurinnfane

caleb143 wrote: »

All true, but The Delta Recruits' whole "purpose" outside of a gear up is not the main point of this thread. They were recruited because of manpower shortages and a way to get warned about the Iconian's real threat is what I think Rurinn was getting at. Regardless, after the war, there is yet another massive shortage, thus the nearly empty fleet bases, but the heavy social zones being swamped, as per the original post.

That's precisely what I was getting at: mass recruiting to compensate for (assumed) losses, with the admittedly confused predestination paradox thing aside. I wasn't aware that mentioning the event would get everyone up in arms, yikes...
But that's where New Dawn can come in with your headcanon as well, the reclamation of Starfleet's initial purpose of exploration as a sort of morale booster/recruitment gig.

caleb143

rurinnfane wrote: »

That's precisely what I was getting at: mass recruiting to compensate for (assumed) losses, with the admittedly confused predestination paradox thing aside. I wasn't aware that mentioning the event would get everyone up in arms, yikes...
But that's where New Dawn can come in with your headcanon as well, the reclamation of Starfleet's initial purpose of exploration as a sort of morale booster/recruitment gig.

Don't think anything of if The forums getting sidetracked is their specialty. But yeah, after years of war, huge losses, and now starfleet is pushing for more exploration, meanwhile there is a lot of empty space in previously bustling places

rurinnfane

caleb143 wrote: »

Yeah. Rurinn and I were talking about something in conjunction to this thread (which is what got me thinking about this thread's topic), on how it was too rushed. A more realistic (yet still equally shocking) timeframe for all this to have happened would have had this game in 2427 at least, in our opinions. And that simply adds to the toll on Starfleet, the KDF, and the Republic, making the empty bases almost like a memorial to the fallen, and filled with old memories and the ghosts of the dead.

I came up with the year 2427 as the official first year of the war -- all the events of STO seem far too crammed together to realistically occur within the time of 1-2 years (they seem like too much for just one captain to handle as well, so I've divided the different story arcs among my various characters, but that's for an entirely different thread). In addition, I like to believe that in the years before and during the war, officers and civilians were kidnapped by Elachi, like the Elachi invasions of Romulan colony worlds as seen early-ish in the Romulan storyline (just minus the Tal'shiar). This justifies all the people found in Elachi incubation chambers in missions like What's Left Behind, and would certainly increase the numbers of casualties/presumed casualties during the war. It would also be a device for war hysteria among the Federation, making the Iconian War *that* much more of a devastating blow.

caleb143

rurinnfane wrote: »

I came up with the year 2427 as the official first year of the war -- all the events of STO seem far too crammed together to realistically occur within the time of 1-2 years (they seem like too much for just one captain to handle as well, so I've divided the different story arcs among my various characters, but that's for an entirely different thread). In addition, I like to believe that in the years before and during the war, officers and civilians were kidnapped by Elachi, like the Elachi invasions of Romulan colony worlds as seen early-ish in the Romulan storyline (just minus the Tal'shiar). This justifies all the people found in Elachi incubation chambers in missions like What's Left Behind, and would certainly increase the numbers of casualties/presumed casualties during the war. It would also be a device for war hysteria among the Federation, making the Iconian War *that* much more of a devastating blow.

You also need to keep in mind a certain TNG episode that Worf makes reference to during Sphere of Influence. Experiments have been run for 30+ years on various races. Who's to say abductions by Elachi haven't happened for as long too, if not longer (*looks to ENT*)?
The Undine also play a large role in the force decimation. They've infiltrated numerous positions in all the powers that be. Who's to say they hadn't had tens of thousands of their forces infiltrating?

The toll keeps mounting if we take into consideration just things linked with Iconians having been involved. It simply skyrockets with everything else we play through in the game.