test content
What is the Arc Client?
Install Arc

"The Needs of the Many" and the Timeline

SystemSystem Member, NoReporting Posts: 178,019 Arc User
All right, so I just finished reading "The Needs of the Many." It was... disappointing. There were some very good parts of the book, things that gave a lot of insight to a few key portions of history that needed clarification (Data's resurrection, and the morality/ethics surrounding it, being the biggest one), but for the most part the book was fluff and silly (Gorn vs Cestus Baseball League? A Baseball game to settle a border dispute between the Gorn and Klingons? For real?). It struck me as a book trying to tell a story that isn't even really touched upon in the game at all. I realized that I didn't even know there had been a "Long War" with the Undine before STO started!

Sadly, it suffers from an issue that I'm beginning to realize plagues ALL of the Star Trek franchise: Too many references to the 20th century. The characters are constantly comparing their current events to 20th century Earth. Talk about World Wars I and II, about Baseball, about people who lived and wrote in the 20th... it's like the time period from the 20th century to the 23rd century never happened, for the most part. Almost no one references World War III, the Eugenics Wars, or the Post-Atomic Horrors. You'd think that, in 400+ years, they'd have other things to talk about and use as references/analogies.

Anyway, the second part of this: The book has the REST of the Countdown to 2409. I read the whole thing, hoping that I could place the events described in the book (The "Long War" with the Undine), only to find that the timeline almost completely ignores it! Supposedly this was a terrible war that caused lots and lots of fear, but the timeline skips it almost entirely, devoting itself to the Gorn vs Klingons, Fed vs. Klingons, and Romulan issues. What in the world were you thinking when you wrote it?

The book seems completely disconnected from the Timeline in the Appendix. And this is sad, because there was so much in the book that could be used by us to tell our stories. It's very, very hard to tell these stories when you can't place them in your character's life, though.

Can we get some sort of fix for this someday, when your writers have some free time?
Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Thats because the game is set in 2409 and a lot of the book is set post-2409, after the wars we are fighting now. :cool:
    Frankly i liked the book very much.

    But your barking up the wrong tree, Cryptic or Cryptic's employees didnt write squat in the book.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Alexraptor wrote: »
    Thats because the game is set in 2409 and a lot of the book is set post-2409, after the wars we are fighting now. :cool:
    Frankly i liked the book very much.

    But your barking up the wrong tree, Cryptic or Cryptic's employees didnt write squat in the book.

    That book is more or less the 'movie novelization' for STO so feedback about it is at least kinda relevant here. So far I've seen people either really like or really hate the book. I suspect I'll be going back and forth on the different parts when I finally read it. And then there's some things that I don't even know if they're intentional in the book but man. I just heard that "Cestus Baseball League" reference for the first time. Know where Cestus is? I wonder if anyone can still play baseball there. Damn Borg :( Little details like that drive home that GO isn't pushing into Borg space - it's territory they've taken, and recently.

    You're correct in that the events described in the interviews are fuzzily placed around our time but the 'Long War' is a name applied in hindsight in the future.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    That seems to be a big problem with that particular author. He did the same thing in Romulan War: Beneath the Raptor's Wing which I also wasn't a big fan of. He tends to bring up constant comparisons in his writing with the Bush Administration and other things. I read/watch Star Trek to get away from political wrangling.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    I liked how they brought in some of the little characters of Star Trek, like Dulmur and Lucsly from the Department of Temporal Investigations(DS9: Trials and Tribbleations)
    How Dulmur remember the events of AGT, even though nobody else did and assumed he was suffering from Temporal Pyschosis, and then the end of that chapter where its revealed that Dulmur's caregiver Quelle is actually......*spoiler, highlight* - >Q
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    That book is more or less the 'movie novelization' for STO so feedback about it is at least kinda relevant here. So far I've seen people either really like or really hate the book. I suspect I'll be going back and forth on the different parts when I finally read it. And then there's some things that I don't even know if they're intentional in the book but man. I just heard that "Cestus Baseball League" reference for the first time. Know where Cestus is? I wonder if anyone can still play baseball there. Damn Borg :( Little details like that drive home that GO isn't pushing into Borg space - it's territory they've taken, and recently.

    You're correct in that the events described in the interviews are fuzzily placed around our time but the 'Long War' is a name applied in hindsight in the future.

    Ah, ok, that makes sense then, that the stories being told relate to the war we're getting ready to fight.

    As for Cestus, yeah. I question why the Klingons and Gorn would be fighting over planets so very far away from their respective territories. It's almost like they decided 'Hey, we need Cestus, so let's put it in Gamma Orionis!' without even thinking about where it SHOULD be. Also, anyone else notice that the Mutara Nebula isn't in the Mutara Sector, like it's supposed to be?

    On that last little bit though, about pushing into borg space... if it was nearby, why would we need to Transwarp there?
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Ah, ok, that makes sense then, that the stories being told relate to the war we're getting ready to fight.

    As for Cestus, yeah. I question why the Klingons and Gorn would be fighting over planets so very far away from their respective territories. It's almost like they decided 'Hey, we need Cestus, so let's put it in Gamma Orionis!' without even thinking about where it SHOULD be. Also, anyone else notice that the Mutara Nebula isn't in the Mutara Sector, like it's supposed to be?

    On that last little bit though, about pushing into borg space... if it was nearby, why would we need to Transwarp there?

    I wish I had time to hunt down the licenced galaxy atlas Cryptic used to place stuff in game by, but the Mutara Nebula and Gamma Orionis in general is very roughly where it should be, tucked around a spur of Klingon space, which is why the gate is needed to get there quickly and safely.

    Wrath of Khan just about took place entirely in Gamma Orionis by that map. It used to be Federation fronteir space and now the Borg are gobbling it up. Much sadness :(
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    wait, the book outlines the events AFTER STO?
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    That seems to be a big problem with that particular author. He did the same thing in Romulan War: Beneath the Raptor's Wing which I also wasn't a big fan of. He tends to bring up constant comparisons in his writing with the Bush Administration and other things. I read/watch Star Trek to get away from political wrangling.

    I have to agree. Michael Martin's books are glorified fanfic. I have stopped reading anything by him for some time now.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    wait, the book outlines the events AFTER STO?

    The book takes place partly or mostly after STO (a few of the interviews are fuzzy about this) but the interviews are mostly reflecting on events that happened before STO.

    It's kinda like "The Visitor" in that it's a possible future starring Jake Sisko that spends most of its time on flashbacks.

    It's people in 2423 reflecting on moments between Nemesis and into early 2409. (The only major glimpse we get into events after the game's launch is that there is apparently a temporal conflict with the Undine that may have started after the Borg incident at Vega Colony. Well, there's that and I suppose it's around or slightly after the game's launch that Jean-Luc and Beverly's son decides against going to Starfleet Academy in favor of founding a Martian Vineyard. I have the distinct impression that they used artificial means to conceive and are currently divorced so their son is probably a close contemporary of our characters.)
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    I wish I had time to hunt down the licenced galaxy atlas Cryptic used to place stuff in game by, but the Mutara Nebula and Gamma Orionis in general is very roughly where it should be, tucked around a spur of Klingon space, which is why the gate is needed to get there quickly and safely.

    Wrath of Khan just about took place entirely in Gamma Orionis by that map. It used to be Federation fronteir space and now the Borg are gobbling it up. Much sadness :(

    Yeah. I've only spotted one discrepancy between the "official" maps and Cryptic's maps and that is that they transposed the positions of two planets in the Neutral Zone. Everything is very much where it should be. The downside to that being, I suppose, that there are some planets that will have to come as package deals. The upside being that the official maps don't have locations for some of the cooler/weirder planets like the ones from Miri, Patterns of Force or A Piece of the Action and so Cryptic has more freedom about where to place them and when to release them.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Yeah. I've only spotted one discrepancy between the "official" maps and Cryptic's maps and that is that they transposed the positions of two planets in the Neutral Zone. Everything is very much where it should be.

    One issue I've seen: Memory Alpha is in the Alpha Quadrant in that map, while in our map it's in the Beta Quadrant.

    Squid: Here's the map you were talking about:

    Star Trek Known Galaxy Map
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    The book takes place partly or mostly after STO (a few of the interviews are fuzzy about this) but the interviews are mostly reflecting on events that happened before STO.

    I was going to post something but Leviathan beat me to it. This quote here is key. The book is set after the war. But it's interviews are mostly reflecting events that lead up to the war. (And a lot of them rather indirectly).

    The Timeline is the meat you're really looking for. The interviews are mostly touches designed around characterization.

    But yeah, it's confusing for a lot in how it's structured because it's set in the future of our future but dwells on the past of our future.

    And really even the most powerful stuff in it has just a passing relevance to what we experience in the game.

    I think Leviathan himself has written more "story" content with some of his posts that more directly relate to this war than ... a few of that book's chapters.

    ;)
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    I apologize for this derailment, but ... SPEAKING OF MAPS ...

    The B'Tran and Gamma Orionis.

    They're firmly in the alpha quadrant? The Mutara Nebula is in GO (seen in Wrath of Khan). So is Cestus (the system which has Cestus III, the planet Kirk fought the Gorn and the planet where Pike City Pioneers and baseball are reborn).

    This is now borg Space, kinda, because of their reappearance in the Vega Colony.

    And this is where the B'Tran Cluster is.

    I ask this merely to get some idea of my bearings. On where this is all happening. Since in the galaxy map it just sort of pops out in it's own map. But some of the spots in there are key to Federation/Klingon issues, as well as some history.

    So you know ... where is this place exactly? In relation to Federation territory and Klingon?
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    superchum wrote: »
    So you know ... where is this place exactly? In relation to Federation territory and Klingon?

    In the top right of what Jarin Solare linked is a less-detailed map that includes some of the stuff in GO to the south of what's detailed in the big map... I could swear I saw one which had detail extending to the area though.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    In the top right of what Jarin Solare linked is a less-detailed map that includes some of the stuff in GO to the south of what's detailed in the big map... I could swear I saw one which had detail extending to the area though.

    I've been looking for other maps, because I know the one you're thinking of and I haven't been able to find it again. I'm going to keep looking.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    Yeah, the entire idea of the novel was silly.
    I can undertand where the author was coming from, not having much to go on, but WOW, what a piece of junk
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited May 2010
    I wish I had time to hunt down the licenced galaxy atlas Cryptic used to place stuff in game by, but the Mutara Nebula and Gamma Orionis in general is very roughly where it should be, tucked around a spur of Klingon space, which is why the gate is needed to get there quickly and safely.

    Wrath of Khan just about took place entirely in Gamma Orionis by that map. It used to be Federation fronteir space and now the Borg are gobbling it up. Much sadness :(

    That would be the Star Trek Star Charts, which is a neat little volume with surprisingly good production quality and equally surprising 'accuracy,' at least as far as astronomy goes. It sort of manages to convey a sense of just how freakin' huge space is!
Sign In or Register to comment.