"We will deal with the federation later" - Empress Sela
Oh and we will !
Forget about the KDF they are not worthy of thought !
But I agree we should have had better alignment options why cant I be on the side of our Empress ?
Because:
- She allowed Hirogen to hunt Romulan citizens.
- She's megalomaniacal, delusional, and paranoid.
- She's self-absorbed and self-centered.
- She cares about nobody and nothing but her own behind.
- She allied with the sociopath Hakeev.
- She isn't even a Romulan!
- She is unworthy of the office of Empress.
- And she's GONE!!! The Iconians took her, just as I was about to blast her ship into space dust.
Because:
- She allowed Hirogen to hunt Romulan citizens.
- She's megalomaniacal, delusional, and paranoid.
- She's self-absorbed and self-centered.
- She cares about nobody and nothing but her own behind.
wait... let me add this up real quick 1+1+1+1=SHE IS TAL SHIAR :P No wonder she hates em two alphas never get along in the same pack! :P /sarcasm
Seriously tho, while I agree she isnt fit to be the Praetor's chamber maid let alone Empress, a good Romulan story would have you climbing the ranks, accumulating your own power, and positioning yourself to replace her as Emperor/Empress, but since you're a PC and cant be given that level of control, youd ally up with someone who would replace her as Emperor/Empress instead and enjoy having their ear... and favors.
Because:
- She allowed Hirogen to hunt Romulan citizens.
- She's megalomaniacal, delusional, and paranoid.
- She's self-absorbed and self-centered.
- She cares about nobody and nothing but her own behind.
- She allied with the sociopath Hakeev.
- She isn't even a Romulan!
- She is unworthy of the office of Empress.
- And she's GONE!!! The Iconians took her, just as I was about to blast her ship into space dust.
You have lost me I miss your point ! Are you sure you are a Romulan ? As for not being Romulan she is more Romulan than unification pacifists, her lineage was not her choice and once her mother was taken (willingly) as a concubine she was as good as Romulan anyway, well she was Romulan property at least. Her actions as a child showed she is more Romulan than most Romulans and she should be proud of it as us true Romulans are of her. I mean her mother trying to steal her away from her lineage who did that Yar think she was ?
The Iconians saved her from people like you they didnt take her away and she WILL be back !
You have lost me I miss your point ! Are you sure you are a Romulan ? As for not being Romulan she is more Romulan than unification pacifists, her lineage was not her choice and once her mother was taken (willingly) as a concubine she was as good as Romulan anyway, well she was Romulan property at least. Her actions as a child showed she is more Romulan than most Romulans and she should be proud of it as us true Romulans are of her. I mean her mother trying to steal her away from her lineage who did that Yar think she was ?
The Iconians saved her from people like you they didnt take her away and she WILL be back !
You know, normally, I don't do this, but...
Did you even read this thread before posting in it?
Protogeth and I deconstructed this entire thing pages and pages ago.
To claim Sela is anything but a crazy half-blood who's rule is based on being able to get the Hiirogen to instal her as rule is just... hilarious. She's not competant (evidence: "Reunification" parts 1 & 2 where her entire plan is nonsensical nonsense), she's only interested in her own self aggrandizement, not the furtherment of the Romulan people as a while (evidence, the fact she sold the people out to the Hirogen) and... really, she's just outright dumb.
Anyway, go back the reread this entire thread, and if it doesn't answer your questions or you disagree with other points, go ahead and post them for discussion...
She used underhanded tactics to gain rule that is a fact but dont all senate rulers ?
She outwitted and foxed her way to rule, that makes her dumb. Your aversion to blondes is clear maybe if we ask her to dye her hair for you you would like her more ?
Please tell me of a senate rule that hasn't sold its people out for their betterment ? When the Romulans are underhanded that makes them Romulan no ?
Name one ROMULAN who has not thought of just themselves even in misguided attempts to "help" Romulans ?
Your a Romulan that thinks like a human, do you approve of reunification ?
p.s just having fun here and in having fun I am more Romulan than you !
Fleet Commander Di'on Charvon, later known as Liviana Charvanek, who responded to an incursion into Romulan territory by a Starfleet vessel and offered amnesty to the crew.
Fleet Commander Di'on Charvon, later known as Liviana Charvanek, who responded to an incursion into Romulan territory by a Starfleet vessel and offered amnesty to the crew.
Seriously, the Tal'Shiar of TNG were an oddity, and anything but typical of Romulans.
I would add to that Dr. Telek R'mor, who while communications between the Federation and Romulans were completely cut off (from his perspective) offered extensive humanitarian assistance to a lost Federation starship, and seemed of the mind that the senate would approve of the efforts. When it became clear that he couldn't help them return, he agreed to try and deliver messages from the lost starship. This is especially noteworthy in that from his perspective there was outright no contact between the Federation and Romulans at the time, but figured that the Empire would approve of helping random Federation strangers out in getting home while lost in space. He's not portraid as irregular of the Romulans at all either, he's very much a Romulan everyman.
If we add in secondary sources for the Romulans to show more of their internal political history, we see other examples of Romulans leaders who care about and are interested in serving the people.
Perhaps most famously: Commander (TRIBBLE Empress) Ael t'Rllaillieu, the second protagonist of the Rihannsu series (sharing the spot with the greatest Starfleet Captain of all time: James Tiberius Kirk), who, if we used a DnD style alignment grid, was Lawful Good, just to show how much of a goody two shoes (for a Romulan) she was. Since she's from the Rihannsu series, which STO draws heavily on as mentioned in my previous posts, she's definately applicable to this conversation.
Further Admiral (TRIBBLE Praetor) Narviat, who was described by Spock as being an idealist Romulan who was genuinely concerned with the wellbeing of the people. He's mainly show in the novel Vulcan's Heart, which also shows the destruction of the Enterprise-C, and all the activities surrounding that. Further, as part of the Vulcan's *Noun* series, it serves as a precursor to the Vulcan's Soul series, which ties back to the Rihannsu series, since it outright shows the Exodus of those who would become the Romulans from Vulcan, the origins of the Remans, and ties the Rihannsu series into the modern Trek novel canon. Which STO also draws on for inspiration.
We have no idea how the internals of the Senate work. IF we go by the inspiration of the Romulans (Rome), as many do, Senate seats are likely hereditary in some fashion. Gaining power in the Senate would then involve lots of tradings of favors, building alliances, and yes, backstabbing. Just like any real political body. Just like what goes on in the Federation Council (though probably with more assassination) or any other deliberative body, real oor imagined.
And Sela didn't use underhanded tactics: she used raw brute barbarism. By involving alien barbarians in her "ascention" to the position of Empress, she wasn't portraying typical Romulan cunning, but rather just being a bully.
As to Reunification: no, my Romulan character thinks Reunification is a bunch of hogwash. At least, from her perspective, such nonesense means giving up all it means to be Rihannsu. S'task and her ancestors did not leave Vulcan so that one day they could embrace Surak's teachings, that's anthetical to S'task's philosophy and the dream of herself and her ancestors. To give up passion and emotion is to give up part of oneself. The exodus happened for a reason, and the divide between Vulcans and Romulans has not decreased, but rather, increased. The Romulans have more in common with the Humans and Andorians than they do with the Vulcans, at least from her perspective, after all, driven by passions and embracing emotions. Motivated by duty, their own forms of honor. Romulans and the others are not so different as most think.
And, to reiterate the point of some of my other essays on this: that is the point of the Romulans in Star Trek. They are the ones who are "no so different" than our heroes. Whenever the Federation and Romulans becomd intertwined, with the exception of TNG, both sides act very similarly. This idea is laid out in the episode that introduced the Romulans: "Balance of Terror" and is reenforced by "The Enterprise Incident", "In a Pale Moonlight", "Reunification" and "Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges" and many, many other times they appear.
Romulans are much, much more complex than being simple mustache twirling villians. Sadly, because we've never had a long running focal Romulan character like we've had for many other races (Worf for the Klingons, a half dozen Cardassians, Kira and others for Bajorans, Spock and Tuvok for Vulcans), people miss that, because we only see small snippets of Romulan character and values, usually through the darkest aspects of their society, the Tal Shiar.
But judging the Romulans by the Tal Shiar would be like judging the Klingons by House Duras, Cardassians by the Obsidian Order, or the Federation by Section 31. Its a peice of the puzzle, and an important one, I'll grant. But its only a peice, and the actions of an intelligence/insec group is no ways reflects the values or culture of the whole of the people.
That would be like judging the USA by the CIA and NSA. Which, if you took that look right now, would be very, very far off from the values of the people within.
Now that peregry has replied to the question about Reunification, I'll add my tuppence worth:
I believe I already linked to this in this thread, but perhaps quoting it will be more effective (please read it all to see my views on the matter, because if you only read to a certain point, you may draw the wrong conclusion):
The point of Reunification is not to force Rihanh to accept Kolinahr. By the same token, the point is not to bring the Thaessu under the Raptor's Wings.
The point is balance. Rihanh have embraced emotion to the point of allowing passions to dominate, and to the detriment of reason. Thaessu have embraced reason to the detriment of emotion.
Aristoteles, one of the great thinkers of the Terrhasu, wrote of an ideal he called "the Golden Mean." This is the middle point between two extremes.
Both of our peoples have chosen extremes (and both have failed in their goals, for the Thaessu still have emotions, often betrayed by virtue of their arrogance and prejudices, and the Rihanh still have reason, perverted by allowing passion to dominate it -- reason has not atrophied in the Rihanh, nor has emotion atrophied in the Thaessu), and both must, eventually, return to the Golden Mean between these two extremes, a situation in which emotion informs reason, and reason mediates the excesses of passion. This is the hope of Reunification.
Rihanh are sometimes criticized for being "deceptive." The Thaessu claim to be incapable of lying, but history shows otherwise.
Emotion is never completely "purged" from the Thaessu, and they will admit that emotion runs deep in them.
Rihanh are not devoid of reason, for Rihan intrigues require rational planning.
Thaessu and Rihanh are the same people, genetically; only cultural differences separate the two. This is not to minimize the importance of those cultural differences; choices have been made which led to cultural divergence. Choice is part of freedom; freedom is essential. But choice is always possible, as long as freedom remains possible and without undue restriction; this means that both sides can still make the choice that both should have made long ago: to be, not anti-emotion nor anti-rationality, but to be as they are innately, with both a rational capability and an emotional capability, in equilibrium.
That all being said, the majority of the Thaessu are, for the moment, still too arrogant in their "Logic" to give due consideration to what they have lost by suppressing emotion. Rihanh are still divided even among themselves, by virtue of their warring passions.
As such, Reunification will not happen at any point in the near future, primarily due to this arrogance on the part of the Thaessu, but the passionate divisions and passion-motivated intrigues of the Rihanh also cannot be ignored in this consideration.
I am Rihan, like you (*). I speak as such. Speaking as a ri'Rihanha in this time of many crises and challenges, I will say that, when faced with the decision of alliance with one side or the other (and no option to simply be Rihan), I could not stomach the idea of allying with the Lloann'mhrahel, because that government is disingenuous in its claims to value and promote freedom. The Lloann'mhrahel is no less a colonial empire than the Klling'hann Nneikha, but they try to pretend otherwise, adopting the euphemistic designation "Federation." They criticize us for being "deceptive," and yet they are even more deceptive. As such, I have chosen alliance with the Klling'hann Nneikha; they are at least honest in naming themselves an empire, and our history with them is long. We have betrayed them in the past, but we have also worked closely with them in the past. We know them and understand their intrigues. We are not so dissimilar.
-- Gessatra ir'Virinat t'Prell
*(Or am I? See my siggy and remember that I am some sort of intelligence agent.)
The siggy referred to at the end there is not my current siggy (although my current siggy does indicate that I'm the head of the Tal'Diann, which is Romulan Military Intelligence), but rather, this one (which I had at the time I wrote the post quoted above):
Operative of Starfleet Military Intelligence?
Orion Spy, Tribal Matriarch, and cousin of Melani D'ian?
Fleet Admiral of the Tal'Diann for the New Romulan Republic?
Vulcan, Orion, Romulan -- whoever I really am, green is involved. Be content with that much truth.
As to Reunification: no, my Romulan character thinks Reunification is a bunch of hogwash. At least, from her perspective, such nonesense means giving up all it means to be Rihannsu. S'task and her ancestors did not leave Vulcan so that one day they could embrace Surak's teachings, that's anthetical to S'task's philosophy and the dream of herself and her ancestors. To give up passion and emotion is to give up part of oneself. The exodus happened for a reason, and the divide between Vulcans and Romulans has not decreased, but rather, increased. The Romulans have more in common with the Humans and Andorians than they do with the Vulcans, at least from her perspective, after all, driven by passions and embracing emotions. Motivated by duty, their own forms of honor. Romulans and the others are not so different as most think.
Nniol tr'Keiniadh is in complete agreement on this point (and also shares your assessment of that so-called "Empress", the jumped-up half-breed who couldn't even buy the loyalty of part of the Fleet, but instead had to bring in mercenaries who hunt her own people in order to seize the Throne).
Ael t'Pirinath, on the other hand, is just a former colonial who found herself thrust into a limelight she never wanted, commanding a ship in order to avoid being executed by the Tal Shiar. She's basically tap-dancing through a minefield in her life, and doesn't give a hlai-TRIBBLE about all this "Unification" stuff. She hasn't even met a Vulcan yet...
Romulans are much, much more complex than being simple mustache twirling villians. Sadly, because we've never had a long running focal Romulan character like we've had for many other races (Worf for the Klingons, a half dozen Cardassians, Kira and others for Bajorans, Spock and Tuvok for Vulcans), people miss that, because we only see small snippets of Romulan character and values, usually through the darkest aspects of their society, the Tal Shiar.
We came close... once... DS9 almost had a Romulan as a regular to operate and maintain the cloaking device on the Defiant.
Thaessu and Rihanh are the same people, genetically; only cultural differences separate the two.
Cultural differences AND a couple thousand years on alien planets altering their physiology. In the case of the Remans, that physiology was altered drastically.
@I30P4RD, really did you have to go there. Peregry and Protogoth are the Residents expect of Romulan lore and they clearly own this thread. I wouldn't go there, they keep posting in there thread which should have been long forgotten. Sela to me she is human not Romulan, she does everything like one. Till this very day, I couldn't even believe she got that far for someone who is a half-breed. Sometime I wonder if there were trying to make her like Shinzon but clearly it didn't work.
"You ask why we give our ships computer normal emotions. Do you really want a warship incapable of loyalty?"
I am frustrated with the storyline as well - (though the addition of the Romulans brought me back to Trek Gaming....the funny part that I have played my Klingon Toon far more than my Romulan one...why?
1) The Romulans suffered from a significant amount of xeno paranoia. They simply do not trust anyone or anything else - this is a common trait - despite what LaForge did or how Picard was treated after Scimitar incident. Those are aberrations.
2) The Romulans are scientifically the equivalent of the Federation - particularly when it comes to military technology - period. Warrior wise they are on par with the Klingon's this is more so in TOS IMHO. They ask for and will give no quarter in battle - so running around as a group of mewling house cats is very contrary to what makes a Romulan - Romulan. In fact if you think about it the loss of the home worlds would make for some angry xenophobes as there sense of abandonment would be complete.....
3) The Typhon Pact books series actually makes a lot of sense for a third playable race......much more than the current state of affairs.
To sum it up....I wish for a more traditional version and not the ridiculous choice of siding with the Feds or Klinks.....neither makes ANY sense.
I am frustrated with the storyline as well - (though the addition of the Romulans brought me back to Trek Gaming....the funny part that I have played my Klingon Toon far more than my Romulan one...why?
1) The Romulans suffered from a significant amount of xeno paranoia. They simply do not trust anyone or anything else - this is a common trait - despite what LaForge did or how Picard was treated after Scimitar incident. Those are aberrations.
2) The Romulans are scientifically the equivalent of the Federation - particularly when it comes to military technology - period. Warrior wise they are on par with the Klingon's this is more so in TOS IMHO. They ask for and will give no quarter in battle - so running around as a group of mewling house cats is very contrary to what makes a Romulan - Romulan. In fact if you think about it the loss of the home worlds would make for some angry xenophobes as there sense of abandonment would be complete.....
3) The Typhon Pact books series actually makes a lot of sense for a third playable race......much more than the current state of affairs.
To sum it up....I wish for a more traditional version and not the ridiculous choice of siding with the Feds or Klinks.....neither makes ANY sense.
1.a. In TOS "Balance of Terror," the similarities between the Romulan Fleet Commander (named Keras in non-canon literature) and Captain Kirk were so strong that Kirk told Keras "In a different reality, I could have called you friend." Xenophobic, maybe, but Keras was not afraid to communicate with an alien, nor to explain his actions to that alien. peregry has already mentioned Doctor Telek R'Mor from VOY "Eye of the Needle, just a few posts back. These Romulans hardly seem as crippled by xenophobic paranoia as you suggest.
2.a. The Romulan people and their resources have suffered a very severe blow with the lost of Romulus and Remus. While they may have the technological knowledge, many scientists are dead, many scientific projects are destroyed, many industrial facilities are no more, etc, etc, etc.
2.b. In TOS "The Enterprise Incident," when a Starfleet vessel (the Enterprise) trespasses into Romulan territory, apparently due to Kirk having gone mad (we find out later in the episode what the real story is), the Romulan Fleet Commander (named Di'on Charvon in non-canon literature, and stated to have changed her name to Liviana Charvanek after the events of the episode in question) offers amnesty to the entire crew of the Enterprise. Sounds to me like Romulans will give quarter. This was also one of the several occasions when the Romulan Star Empire was allied with the Klingon Empire (in canon).
1.b. The aberration is the Tal'Shiar. Honestly, you think all of the Romulan people run around acting like the Secret Police all the time?
I would further notes that there's another example of the Romulans being welcoming to an outsider:
Stefan DeSeve - a human who defected from Starfleet to the Romulans (and then later defected back to the Federation). Yes, he decided he disliked the Romulan attitudes of the time, but of the things he mentioned as disliking them for, xenophobia was not one of them.
As to scientifically equal to the Federation: I think STO shows this. Their science is different, but equal if not better than the Federation (depending on how you look at it). Singularity Cores, the various Warbirds, their weapons systems. And when it comes to Cloaking, Cryptic did a good job as showing the Romulans as the absolutel masters of them. All their ships have battle cloaks, from the smallest T'varo to the largest Scimitar. They get exclusive abilities involving cloaking devices (the various BOff powers).
A good exmaple of this equal but different is in the Veteran ships. Compare the three Vet ships and you'll immediately see how Cryptic (to me at least) successfully makde the Romulans as having a different technology base, but being equal to the Federation and Klingons. It should also be noted that the Daeinos (Rihan for "Immortal") is stated to be designed and produced by the Republic, not a ship held over from the Empire like the other ships. So one of the most advanced ships in the game which showcases Romulan technology, is produced by the Republic.
I have ont read the Typhon pact series. I only recently got back into Trek novels with the Rihannsu and Vulcan's Soul series. From my understanding, in the current novels the Romulans have fractured into two major powers, one a member of the Typhon Pact and the other a member of the Khitomer Accord (which is an alliance of the Feds, Cardies, Kling and others). Seeing how STO broke up the alliance of the Feds and Klingons (that's a different debate, so let's not go there), they can't follow the plot of those novels.
However, in STO they did make the Romulans split into two (primary) factions. The Republic and the Imperial remnant. Since they chose not to make the Romulans a full faction and instead use this alliance system, and wanted to only have to make one Romulan storyline, they sort of needed to keep the players as part of one faction.
That said, you don't have to roleplay the storyline of the Romulans as presented. A person can create their complete own storyline for their character. You can roleplay as a member of the Imperial Remnant if you want, an independant mercenary, or as a member of the Republic (I've met people in each camp!). Cryptic even provides you with the tools to do so, with the TNG and Tal Shiar uniforms and the IRW prefix for your ship!
The alliance system does feel shoehorned, I will grant. Given my way, I would have simply made the Republic its own faction. However, I can understand Crytpic's decision not to. They wanted to be able to focus their workload and not split the playerbase. The method they came up with, frankly, isn't bad. STO is also good in that you can play with members of other factions and communicate with them freely, with the exception of teaming on episodes. Who you play as is purely a playstyle and asthetic choice at the end of the day. As such, I have a lot of trouble finding fault in Crytpic for doing what they did. They only have so much personel and so much money, they have to make decisions based on that.
@peregry, I haven't read the Typhoon Pack books, but from what you stated about the alliance sound more like what is in the Typhoon books. Since we have the republic going both Fed and KDF.
"You ask why we give our ships computer normal emotions. Do you really want a warship incapable of loyalty?"
Mostly, but not quite. Doctor Telek R'Mor was not military or Tal'Shiar. He certainly wasn't like Tal'Shiar toadies and thugs, though.
The mistake cryptic made was pretty much saying if your nor republic your evil tal'shiar and you can't be that. there needs to be a third option Romulan military remnants. they were not all destroyed in hobus and not all of them were defeated or joined the tal'shiar, since many in the romulan military despised the tal'shiar it would make sense that many of them broke away to keep fighting the good fight (but not to form the republic) when sela staged her coup.
Like Telek R'mor others like Alidar Jarok were not evil and while they wouldn't join the republic as they were patriots they wouldn't side with sela either.
The main reason things are as they are boils down to what Mr stahl said "we wanted to keep this a red vs blue game" this was pretty much to not anger the fed and kdf pvper's
I pvp alot myself so it's not a put down to pvp but it's just the plain truth.
You are federation or Kdf whether you want to or not. That's why in many missions you are addressed as Kdf or Fed by npcs you use their starbases they are on your planet and you can go to theirs etc, etc.
While I will agree with the sentiment that in the Enterprise Incident she did say that they would return the crew to the Federation you can make an equal case against that with what the Romulans did with survivors of the Enterprise C.....there are probably adequate examples to support either side.
I did do some looking for Writing Guides on the series (TOS/TNG) This is rather a lot of surprising blogs and sources - for example I did not realize that Roddenberry was fairly strongly opposed to Diane Duane's book series - going so far to ask to have "Star Trek" removed from it....initially the Romulans are for all intents and purposes the Red Chinese portion of Star Trek (the Klingons being the Russians).....I am assuming that this is known though when I have talked to my sons they seemed perplexed by this...here is a descriptor of the Romulans from the link provided below....(btw I am not saying this right or wrong but does explain some of this...)The Romulan Star Empire lies between the Klingon Empire and the United Federation of Planets. This position is a tenuous one, and has caused much hardship on the people of the Empire in the times that the Klingons and the Federation were at war.
The governmental structure of the Romulan Star Empire is a tri-cameral system, with nearly equal power divided among the following branches: the Praetorite, the Senate, and the Tal Shi'ar. Each of these has a specific duty in the Empire and each serves as a check and balance on the others to insure that no one else has more power than the others think they should have. This setup is similar to the Chinese form of government, insuring that no one office or person becomes too powerful and upsets the delicate balance of power.
The hereditary Praetorite is the judicial branch of the Empire. They write and enforce the laws and control the Star Navy, the military arm of the Empire. While the office is lifelong, people have been removed from office for non compliance with the Empire and other various crimes. Such people usually do not live very long after removal from office, if at all. The Senate is in charge of legislating the laws of the Empire and making sure that the people pay their taxes. This office is also hereditary and carries a lifelong term. These offices correlate to the lifelong offices of the Chinese government, though they are not generally hereditary.
The Tal Shi'ar, the intelligence gathering arm of the Empire, is a very thorough organization, considered the best in the galaxy. They are ruthless in their loyalty to the Empire and have ways of finding out information that would impress most of the known galactic governments. This branch of government is generally given free rein in their work, as the citizens of the Empire do not wish to be arrested for trumped up charges of treason for their interference. Similarly, the Chinese intelligence corps is known for its torture methods and is a feared tormentor.
The Romulan Star Empire is an aggressive enemy of the United Federation of Planets. Their first contact was when a Starfleet exploration vessel entered their system, setting off a perimeter alarm of satellites.[4] This frightened the peoples of the twin planets, evoking memories of the pirates that had originally caused them to break away from their mother-world of Vulcan. This ship named the planets Romulus and Remus, after the two Roman children raised by wolves.[5]
The second encounter was no better, and by that time the Romulans had re-established space travel, and launched a full-scale attack on the invaders. This led to an all-out war. The Romulans soon discovered the technology of warp drives from destroyed Starfleet ships and adapting that technology for their own ships.
This war ended when the United Federation of Planets took the advice of the Vulcan Ambassador, Sarek, to end the war and "close the door on them", meaning for the Federation to leave them alone and ignore them.[6] The treaty to end the war was the only one in Federation history to be completed solely by data transmission, and the Federation never got a glimpse of a live R omulan, only dead and vacuum-damaged ones. This peace treaty, named The Treaty of Alpha Trianguli,[7] established the Romulan Neutral Zone, and has remained intact since the signing. While there were breaches in the Zone, none of them were sufficient to lead to a war between the Romulan Star Empire and the United Federation of Planets.
Currently, Ambassador Spock is addressing a movement in the Empire to return to the Vulcan philosophy and way of life. This movement was set back by a Senator Pardek and his actions with the Praetorite, but continues to be an underground revolution. While the initial response to this is unclear, the Federation hopes to contact this movement again in the future.[8]
In the past seventy years, the Romulan Empire and the Klingon Empire have had two major wars, with the Klingons winning the first.[9] This war led to the development of an economic dependence on the Klingons for weapons and ships and led to an economic depression in the Romulan Empire. This action led to a very strong dislike for Klingons and their goods, since it is commonly said that the lowest bidder gets the market in Klingons arms deals.[10] Whether this idea is true is up to the reader, but evidence proves that Klingon weapons and ships are prone to disaster.
This war between the Klingons and Romulans closely resembles the problems between the Soviets and the Chinese following the death of Stalin. By 1963, the two countries were exchanging insults across their shared border and engaging in competition for Communist leadership on the planet. This split replaced the original Soviet face for Communism and added the Chinese ideology.[11]
The second war between the Romulans and the Klingons ended in the Romulan's favor, ending the economic dependence on Klingon technology and leading to a seventy-year isolationist period where the Empire tried to recuperate from the loses entailed during the two wars. Currently the two Empires are at an uneasy peace, as the Klingons are now an ally of the Federation, due to the destruction of Praxis's moon and the peace treaty of Khitomer that followed.[12] The Romulan Empire and the Federation are also at an uneasy period of peace, although it is unknown how long this truce will last.
And, Scrag, the destruction of ch'Rihan in the subspace wave from the Hobus event destroyed the existing Romulan Star Empire. The Tal Shiar is the only remaining "branch" of that government; Praetor Taris is imprisoned at Facility 4028 (unless you chose the option to kill all the escapees), Empress Sela is in the hands of the Iconians, her fate unknown, and the Senate is gone. The Imperial Fleet has either sworn fealty to the Tal Shiar, or spaced their political officers and defected to the Romulan Republic, as there is no third option currently (any attempt to form another independent Empire will be weakened by a lack of support from D'tan's people, and stifled by forces loyal to the Tal Shiar).
On the other tentacle, one does wonder if there shouldn't be some changes in the story in the wake of the death of Hakeev and the kidnap of the Empress. Whoever was Hakeev's second is now in charge of the Tal Shiar faction - and that person might actually be loyal to the Star Empire, rather than his/her own ambitions, which could change things radically in the Psi Velorum sector, if not the entire Alpha Quadrant.
And, Scrag, the destruction of ch'Rihan in the subspace wave from the Hobus event destroyed the existing Romulan Star Empire. The Tal Shiar is the only remaining "branch" of that government; Praetor Taris is imprisoned at Facility 4028 (unless you chose the option to kill all the escapees), Empress Sela is in the hands of the Iconians, her fate unknown, and the Senate is gone. The Imperial Fleet has either sworn fealty to the Tal Shiar, or spaced their political officers and defected to the Romulan Republic, as there is no third option currently (any attempt to form another independent Empire will be weakened by a lack of support from D'tan's people, and stifled by forces loyal to the Tal Shiar).
On the other tentacle, one does wonder if there shouldn't be some changes in the story in the wake of the death of Hakeev and the kidnap of the Empress. Whoever was Hakeev's second is now in charge of the Tal Shiar faction - and that person might actually be loyal to the Star Empire, rather than his/her own ambitions, which could change things radically in the Psi Velorum sector, if not the entire Alpha Quadrant.
The idea that the all other branches of the romulan government were destroyed in the hobus incedent or swore fealty to the tal'shiar or defected to the republic is laughable at best (no disrespect meant). Though the capital for the military and senate were on Romulus it was still a empire, Meaning that there were other worlds and failsafes in place sure it would be a major setback but not a total collapse.
Every government today doesn't have all their soldiers and politicians in the capital without a backup plan in case of a disaster. No matter if they use the judicial, executive, legislative system or not. there is a chain of command with other members of the government and armed forces spread out to carry on the fight and assume new responsibilities if necessary. And the Governments even in the worst disaster today wouldn't let the intelligence agencies assume absolute control over the entire countries.
Astro, you mistake the distributed form of government common in Western democracies for how governments in general work. Historically, sacking the capital of a nation has meant that nation's demise; that's why the British were so intent on burning down the White House in the War of 1812, because they thought that would lead to the new nation's collapse.
Empires, especially, tend to be centralized, as a means of curbing the ambitions of the lesser members of government. When it can take days or weeks for messengers to pass between the capital and the outlying provinces, too much authority given to provincial governors can lead to rebellion. (That's why Lord Vader was aboard Tarkin's Death Star in Star Wars, and why provincial governors in Pournelle's Empire of Man have to have served in the Imperial Navy and be personally trusted by the Emperor - in each case, it kept significant military resources under the control of people personally loyal to the Emperor himself.) This is particularly important in empires where there are outlying "barbarians" who might tempt the governors into changing allegiance. The Romulan Star Empire can only be kept under control if the central government has a tight grip on everything - and you can't do that when the Imperial government is scattered to several worlds. From a defensive standpoint, it makes sense, but from an imperialist standpoint, it's foolish.
(Why is it that no one questions the potential collapse of the Klingon Empire after Praxis, but when it's the Romulans it's suddenly unbelievable?)
I don't mistake it for a democracy at all, long before democracies, governments that could only be described on a good day as dictatorships/empires had some failsafes. they didn't have all troops in the capital cities otherwise, they could never have become empires or maintained their strength. even the most strict governments today that do not follow anything close to a democracy have backup plans in place, in case of uprising in their countries they have a strong presence in the capital but that's not where all the power is. There is most times a close trusted general or prime minister is second in command in case of the death of the leader and lives in another location with some of the military.
The romulans had a very strict paranoid at times isolationist policy but they weren't stupid sure there was a strong presence in the capital system but they also had a strong presence in other planets of their empire and as for barbarians in outer territories the romulans didn't put up with upstart species much in their population except using them as slave labor since they viewed them as lower species much less be tempted by bribes (only exception being the reman insurrection).
To compare the governing system of the galactic empire in starwars to that in trek with the romulans is apples to oranges but I won't even touch that further.
To keep with the theme though. Ancient rome as a capital was lost but the roman empire went on for hundreds of years with a new capital in Constantinople before it's ultimate collapse. More recently though Before the sacking of Washington in the war of 1812 that you mentioned, the American capital of Philadelphia was captured by General Howe in the revolutionary war but it didn't crush the rebellion or the continental army as it wasn't all in the capital.
Point i'm stating is that beyond dispute is cryptic left some holes in the romulan plot just like they did with the Federation/Klingon war and that they based this faction mostly around pvp (red vs blue) to keep the status quo of a war plot that didn't make any sense in the first place.
Now, I would further point out that the Romulans had no reason make such failsafes in regard to system annhilation. Why should they? Have any groups they normally deal with throw around systems designed to annhilation entire solar systems? I'm sure there are a few, but none that I am aware of deployed by any of the political powers. The closest might be the Genesis device, but as far as we've seen, the knowledge of how to build and deploy that device is only held by the Federation (maybe) and even the Romulans are not so paranoid to think the Feds would use such a weapon.
And you're right they had failsafes for evacuating the system. But evacuating a system takes a long time. Part of the reasons the Hobbes disaster was so bad was they thought they had years to plan and carry out the evacuation of the system, but the wave of destruction propogated much faster than anticipated due to it not following the rules of physics. Remember, a supernova is a pure realspace phenominon. Even assuming the wave propagates at the speed of light (which seems unlikely) you'd have years before it reached the system. But then it did something completely unexpected, entered subspace and expanded at FTL speeds, which caught everyone off guard.
To put this into real world terms, this is the same as a hurricane threatening a coastline and being a week away, giving everyone plenty of time to prepare and evacuate and then it suddenly teleporting from where it is over the ocean right on top of a city in its full might. It makes no scientific or rational sense, there was nothing that anyone could do to prepare for it, and everyone was caught with their pants down. You might as well be dealing with a Q for all the rationality that's involved.
So they couldn't prepare, they were still making the plans to prepare, discussing the various ideas and choosing the best one. The only people with a clue as to it being irregular were Spock and Nero, who tried implimenting a plan to carry it out, and the Vulcans understandably had trouble believing that a supernova was acting in such an illogical way.
I'll post more on the China/Romulan connection later. It's true, but to only look at things through a Cold War lens isn't fair to the setting and ignores many other parrallels between the Romulans and other Earth cultures.
The mistake cryptic made was pretty much saying if your not republic your evil tal'shiar and you can't be that. there needs to be a third option Romulan military remnants. they were not all destroyed in hobus and not all of them were defeated or joined the tal'shiar, since many in the romulan military despised the tal'shiar it would make sense that many of them broke away to keep fighting the good fight (but not to form the republic) when sela staged her coup.
Like Telek R'mor others like Alidar Jarok were not evil and while they wouldn't join the republic as they were patriots they wouldn't side with sela either.
The main reason things are as they are boils down to what Mr stahl said "we wanted to keep this a red vs blue game" this was pretty much to not anger the fed and kdf pvper's
I pvp alot myself so it's not a put down to pvp but it's just the plain truth.
A brutal and sad truth Cryptic needs to change >.<
for example I did not realize that Roddenberry was fairly strongly opposed to Diane Duane's book series - going so far to ask to have "Star Trek" removed from it....initially the Romulans are for all intents and purposes the Red Chinese portion of Star Trek (the Klingons being the Russians).....I am assuming that this is known though when I have talked to my sons they seemed perplexed by this...
The idea that the all other branches of the romulan government were destroyed in the hobus incedent or swore fealty to the tal'shiar or defected to the republic is laughable at best (no disrespect meant). Though the capital for the military and senate were on Romulus it was still a empire, Meaning that there were other worlds and failsafes in place sure it would be a major setback but not a total collapse.
Every government today doesn't have all their soldiers and politicians in the capital without a backup plan in case of a disaster. No matter if they use the judicial, executive, legislative system or not. there is a chain of command with other members of the government and armed forces spread out to carry on the fight and assume new responsibilities if necessary. And the Governments even in the worst disaster today wouldn't let the intelligence agencies assume absolute control over the entire countries.
Sort of agree, there would be many sub-factions tho the Senate likely was indeed a total(near total) loss. Romulans were far more centralized than the other major factions. All roads led to Romulus to modify an old phrase.
I don't mistake it for a democracy at all, long before democracies, governments that could only be described on a good day as dictatorships/empires had some failsafes. they didn't have all troops in the capital cities otherwise, they could never have become empires or maintained their strength. even the most strict governments today that do not follow anything close to a democracy have backup plans in place, in case of uprising in their countries they have a strong presence in the capital but that's not where all the power is. There is most times a close trusted general or prime minister is second in command in case of the death of the leader and lives in another location with some of the military.
One of the things that contributed to the fall of the Byzantine Empire was its strong centralized system, esp in regards to troop training and manufacture of weapons. They just couldnt get out to the front fast enough and the outer reaches were TRIBBLE poorly defended, and nearly incapable of mounting effective fighting forces while they waited on the Elites from Constantinople like the Kataphractoi cavalry.
And you're right they had failsafes for evacuating the system. But evacuating a system takes a long time. Part of the reasons the Hobbes disaster was so bad was they thought they had years to plan and carry out the evacuation of the system, but the wave of destruction propogated much faster than anticipated due to it not following the rules of physics. Remember, a supernova is a pure realspace phenominon. Even assuming the wave propagates at the speed of light (which seems unlikely) you'd have years before it reached the system. But then it did something completely unexpected, entered subspace and expanded at FTL speeds, which caught everyone off guard.
To put this into real world terms, this is the same as a hurricane threatening a coastline and being a week away, giving everyone plenty of time to prepare and evacuate and then it suddenly teleporting from where it is over the ocean right on top of a city in its full might. It makes no scientific or rational sense, there was nothing that anyone could do to prepare for it, and everyone was caught with their pants down. You might as well be dealing with a Q for all the rationality that's involved.
Actually its worse than that, its stated in the game that the explosion GAINED in power with every planet it destroyed. Not only did it travel at warp speeds it was stronger, not weaker, when it hit the homeworlds. So your teleporting hurricane is Cat3 before the teleport and Cat5 after. That said, the incident did take a few days before it struck Romulus and Remus, while the tragedy was still insane, a government can do an impressive amount of evacuating VIPs in 24hrs
Comments
Oh and we will !
Forget about the KDF they are not worthy of thought !
But I agree we should have had better alignment options why cant I be on the side of our Empress ?
Because:
- She allowed Hirogen to hunt Romulan citizens.
- She's megalomaniacal, delusional, and paranoid.
- She's self-absorbed and self-centered.
- She cares about nobody and nothing but her own behind.
- She allied with the sociopath Hakeev.
- She isn't even a Romulan!
- She is unworthy of the office of Empress.
- And she's GONE!!! The Iconians took her, just as I was about to blast her ship into space dust.
Seriously tho, while I agree she isnt fit to be the Praetor's chamber maid let alone Empress, a good Romulan story would have you climbing the ranks, accumulating your own power, and positioning yourself to replace her as Emperor/Empress, but since you're a PC and cant be given that level of control, youd ally up with someone who would replace her as Emperor/Empress instead and enjoy having their ear... and favors.
You have lost me I miss your point ! Are you sure you are a Romulan ? As for not being Romulan she is more Romulan than unification pacifists, her lineage was not her choice and once her mother was taken (willingly) as a concubine she was as good as Romulan anyway, well she was Romulan property at least. Her actions as a child showed she is more Romulan than most Romulans and she should be proud of it as us true Romulans are of her. I mean her mother trying to steal her away from her lineage who did that Yar think she was ?
The Iconians saved her from people like you they didnt take her away and she WILL be back !
You know, normally, I don't do this, but...
Did you even read this thread before posting in it?
Protogeth and I deconstructed this entire thing pages and pages ago.
To start with Overview of the Romulans in STO and their inspiration..
Further details on the history of the portrayal of Romulans in Star Trek.
My third essay on this matter.
To claim Sela is anything but a crazy half-blood who's rule is based on being able to get the Hiirogen to instal her as rule is just... hilarious. She's not competant (evidence: "Reunification" parts 1 & 2 where her entire plan is nonsensical nonsense), she's only interested in her own self aggrandizement, not the furtherment of the Romulan people as a while (evidence, the fact she sold the people out to the Hirogen) and... really, she's just outright dumb.
Anyway, go back the reread this entire thread, and if it doesn't answer your questions or you disagree with other points, go ahead and post them for discussion...
She outwitted and foxed her way to rule, that makes her dumb. Your aversion to blondes is clear maybe if we ask her to dye her hair for you you would like her more ?
Please tell me of a senate rule that hasn't sold its people out for their betterment ? When the Romulans are underhanded that makes them Romulan no ?
Name one ROMULAN who has not thought of just themselves even in misguided attempts to "help" Romulans ?
Your a Romulan that thinks like a human, do you approve of reunification ?
p.s just having fun here and in having fun I am more Romulan than you !
Fleet Commander Keras, whose honor cannot be questioned.
Fleet Commander Di'on Charvon, later known as Liviana Charvanek, who responded to an incursion into Romulan territory by a Starfleet vessel and offered amnesty to the crew.
Admiral Alidar Jarok, motivated by his concern for his daughter's future.
Seriously, the Tal'Shiar of TNG were an oddity, and anything but typical of Romulans.
I would add to that Dr. Telek R'mor, who while communications between the Federation and Romulans were completely cut off (from his perspective) offered extensive humanitarian assistance to a lost Federation starship, and seemed of the mind that the senate would approve of the efforts. When it became clear that he couldn't help them return, he agreed to try and deliver messages from the lost starship. This is especially noteworthy in that from his perspective there was outright no contact between the Federation and Romulans at the time, but figured that the Empire would approve of helping random Federation strangers out in getting home while lost in space. He's not portraid as irregular of the Romulans at all either, he's very much a Romulan everyman.
If we add in secondary sources for the Romulans to show more of their internal political history, we see other examples of Romulans leaders who care about and are interested in serving the people.
Perhaps most famously: Commander (TRIBBLE Empress) Ael t'Rllaillieu, the second protagonist of the Rihannsu series (sharing the spot with the greatest Starfleet Captain of all time: James Tiberius Kirk), who, if we used a DnD style alignment grid, was Lawful Good, just to show how much of a goody two shoes (for a Romulan) she was. Since she's from the Rihannsu series, which STO draws heavily on as mentioned in my previous posts, she's definately applicable to this conversation.
Further Admiral (TRIBBLE Praetor) Narviat, who was described by Spock as being an idealist Romulan who was genuinely concerned with the wellbeing of the people. He's mainly show in the novel Vulcan's Heart, which also shows the destruction of the Enterprise-C, and all the activities surrounding that. Further, as part of the Vulcan's *Noun* series, it serves as a precursor to the Vulcan's Soul series, which ties back to the Rihannsu series, since it outright shows the Exodus of those who would become the Romulans from Vulcan, the origins of the Remans, and ties the Rihannsu series into the modern Trek novel canon. Which STO also draws on for inspiration.
We have no idea how the internals of the Senate work. IF we go by the inspiration of the Romulans (Rome), as many do, Senate seats are likely hereditary in some fashion. Gaining power in the Senate would then involve lots of tradings of favors, building alliances, and yes, backstabbing. Just like any real political body. Just like what goes on in the Federation Council (though probably with more assassination) or any other deliberative body, real oor imagined.
And Sela didn't use underhanded tactics: she used raw brute barbarism. By involving alien barbarians in her "ascention" to the position of Empress, she wasn't portraying typical Romulan cunning, but rather just being a bully.
As to Reunification: no, my Romulan character thinks Reunification is a bunch of hogwash. At least, from her perspective, such nonesense means giving up all it means to be Rihannsu. S'task and her ancestors did not leave Vulcan so that one day they could embrace Surak's teachings, that's anthetical to S'task's philosophy and the dream of herself and her ancestors. To give up passion and emotion is to give up part of oneself. The exodus happened for a reason, and the divide between Vulcans and Romulans has not decreased, but rather, increased. The Romulans have more in common with the Humans and Andorians than they do with the Vulcans, at least from her perspective, after all, driven by passions and embracing emotions. Motivated by duty, their own forms of honor. Romulans and the others are not so different as most think.
And, to reiterate the point of some of my other essays on this: that is the point of the Romulans in Star Trek. They are the ones who are "no so different" than our heroes. Whenever the Federation and Romulans becomd intertwined, with the exception of TNG, both sides act very similarly. This idea is laid out in the episode that introduced the Romulans: "Balance of Terror" and is reenforced by "The Enterprise Incident", "In a Pale Moonlight", "Reunification" and "Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges" and many, many other times they appear.
Romulans are much, much more complex than being simple mustache twirling villians. Sadly, because we've never had a long running focal Romulan character like we've had for many other races (Worf for the Klingons, a half dozen Cardassians, Kira and others for Bajorans, Spock and Tuvok for Vulcans), people miss that, because we only see small snippets of Romulan character and values, usually through the darkest aspects of their society, the Tal Shiar.
But judging the Romulans by the Tal Shiar would be like judging the Klingons by House Duras, Cardassians by the Obsidian Order, or the Federation by Section 31. Its a peice of the puzzle, and an important one, I'll grant. But its only a peice, and the actions of an intelligence/insec group is no ways reflects the values or culture of the whole of the people.
That would be like judging the USA by the CIA and NSA. Which, if you took that look right now, would be very, very far off from the values of the people within.
He is almost a privateer, and has a mutually beneficial arrangement with the Tal Shiar, but is by no means their asset.
Valdus | Charn | Costello | Typhus | Thyran
I believe I already linked to this in this thread, but perhaps quoting it will be more effective (please read it all to see my views on the matter, because if you only read to a certain point, you may draw the wrong conclusion):
The siggy referred to at the end there is not my current siggy (although my current siggy does indicate that I'm the head of the Tal'Diann, which is Romulan Military Intelligence), but rather, this one (which I had at the time I wrote the post quoted above):
Orion Spy, Tribal Matriarch, and cousin of Melani D'ian?
Fleet Admiral of the Tal'Diann for the New Romulan Republic?
Vulcan, Orion, Romulan -- whoever I really am, green is involved. Be content with that much truth.
A more thorough explanation of the signature can be found in my post here:
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=12044841#post12044841
Ael t'Pirinath, on the other hand, is just a former colonial who found herself thrust into a limelight she never wanted, commanding a ship in order to avoid being executed by the Tal Shiar. She's basically tap-dancing through a minefield in her life, and doesn't give a hlai-TRIBBLE about all this "Unification" stuff. She hasn't even met a Vulcan yet...
We came close... once... DS9 almost had a Romulan as a regular to operate and maintain the cloaking device on the Defiant.
Cultural differences AND a couple thousand years on alien planets altering their physiology. In the case of the Remans, that physiology was altered drastically.
Why should it have been long forgotten? Its constructive, flame free, and chock full of excellent ideas.
That's my point, and since they keep coming out with more constructive and excellent ideas the thread Endure.
1) The Romulans suffered from a significant amount of xeno paranoia. They simply do not trust anyone or anything else - this is a common trait - despite what LaForge did or how Picard was treated after Scimitar incident. Those are aberrations.
2) The Romulans are scientifically the equivalent of the Federation - particularly when it comes to military technology - period. Warrior wise they are on par with the Klingon's this is more so in TOS IMHO. They ask for and will give no quarter in battle - so running around as a group of mewling house cats is very contrary to what makes a Romulan - Romulan. In fact if you think about it the loss of the home worlds would make for some angry xenophobes as there sense of abandonment would be complete.....
3) The Typhon Pact books series actually makes a lot of sense for a third playable race......much more than the current state of affairs.
To sum it up....I wish for a more traditional version and not the ridiculous choice of siding with the Feds or Klinks.....neither makes ANY sense.
1.a. In TOS "Balance of Terror," the similarities between the Romulan Fleet Commander (named Keras in non-canon literature) and Captain Kirk were so strong that Kirk told Keras "In a different reality, I could have called you friend." Xenophobic, maybe, but Keras was not afraid to communicate with an alien, nor to explain his actions to that alien. peregry has already mentioned Doctor Telek R'Mor from VOY "Eye of the Needle, just a few posts back. These Romulans hardly seem as crippled by xenophobic paranoia as you suggest.
2.a. The Romulan people and their resources have suffered a very severe blow with the lost of Romulus and Remus. While they may have the technological knowledge, many scientists are dead, many scientific projects are destroyed, many industrial facilities are no more, etc, etc, etc.
2.b. In TOS "The Enterprise Incident," when a Starfleet vessel (the Enterprise) trespasses into Romulan territory, apparently due to Kirk having gone mad (we find out later in the episode what the real story is), the Romulan Fleet Commander (named Di'on Charvon in non-canon literature, and stated to have changed her name to Liviana Charvanek after the events of the episode in question) offers amnesty to the entire crew of the Enterprise. Sounds to me like Romulans will give quarter. This was also one of the several occasions when the Romulan Star Empire was allied with the Klingon Empire (in canon).
1.b. The aberration is the Tal'Shiar. Honestly, you think all of the Romulan people run around acting like the Secret Police all the time?
Stefan DeSeve - a human who defected from Starfleet to the Romulans (and then later defected back to the Federation). Yes, he decided he disliked the Romulan attitudes of the time, but of the things he mentioned as disliking them for, xenophobia was not one of them.
As to scientifically equal to the Federation: I think STO shows this. Their science is different, but equal if not better than the Federation (depending on how you look at it). Singularity Cores, the various Warbirds, their weapons systems. And when it comes to Cloaking, Cryptic did a good job as showing the Romulans as the absolutel masters of them. All their ships have battle cloaks, from the smallest T'varo to the largest Scimitar. They get exclusive abilities involving cloaking devices (the various BOff powers).
A good exmaple of this equal but different is in the Veteran ships. Compare the three Vet ships and you'll immediately see how Cryptic (to me at least) successfully makde the Romulans as having a different technology base, but being equal to the Federation and Klingons. It should also be noted that the Daeinos (Rihan for "Immortal") is stated to be designed and produced by the Republic, not a ship held over from the Empire like the other ships. So one of the most advanced ships in the game which showcases Romulan technology, is produced by the Republic.
I have ont read the Typhon pact series. I only recently got back into Trek novels with the Rihannsu and Vulcan's Soul series. From my understanding, in the current novels the Romulans have fractured into two major powers, one a member of the Typhon Pact and the other a member of the Khitomer Accord (which is an alliance of the Feds, Cardies, Kling and others). Seeing how STO broke up the alliance of the Feds and Klingons (that's a different debate, so let's not go there), they can't follow the plot of those novels.
However, in STO they did make the Romulans split into two (primary) factions. The Republic and the Imperial remnant. Since they chose not to make the Romulans a full faction and instead use this alliance system, and wanted to only have to make one Romulan storyline, they sort of needed to keep the players as part of one faction.
That said, you don't have to roleplay the storyline of the Romulans as presented. A person can create their complete own storyline for their character. You can roleplay as a member of the Imperial Remnant if you want, an independant mercenary, or as a member of the Republic (I've met people in each camp!). Cryptic even provides you with the tools to do so, with the TNG and Tal Shiar uniforms and the IRW prefix for your ship!
The alliance system does feel shoehorned, I will grant. Given my way, I would have simply made the Republic its own faction. However, I can understand Crytpic's decision not to. They wanted to be able to focus their workload and not split the playerbase. The method they came up with, frankly, isn't bad. STO is also good in that you can play with members of other factions and communicate with them freely, with the exception of teaming on episodes. Who you play as is purely a playstyle and asthetic choice at the end of the day. As such, I have a lot of trouble finding fault in Crytpic for doing what they did. They only have so much personel and so much money, they have to make decisions based on that.
Thank god someone said it.
Fleet Admiral Rylana - Fed Tac - U.S.S Wild Card - Tactical Miracle Worker Cruiser
Lifetime Subscriber since 2012 == 17,200 Accolades = RIP PvP and Vice Squad
Chief of Starfleet Intelligence Service == Praise Cheesus
Remember the episodes with Data and Picard on Romulus?
The civilians were terrified of the Tal'Shiar, they wanted nothing to do with them, wanted to do nothing to bring their attention upon them.
We are playing Romulans, we're not playing Tal'Shiar.
Mostly, but not quite. Doctor Telek R'Mor was not military or Tal'Shiar. He certainly wasn't like Tal'Shiar toadies and thugs, though.
The mistake cryptic made was pretty much saying if your nor republic your evil tal'shiar and you can't be that. there needs to be a third option Romulan military remnants. they were not all destroyed in hobus and not all of them were defeated or joined the tal'shiar, since many in the romulan military despised the tal'shiar it would make sense that many of them broke away to keep fighting the good fight (but not to form the republic) when sela staged her coup.
Like Telek R'mor others like Alidar Jarok were not evil and while they wouldn't join the republic as they were patriots they wouldn't side with sela either.
The main reason things are as they are boils down to what Mr stahl said "we wanted to keep this a red vs blue game" this was pretty much to not anger the fed and kdf pvper's
I pvp alot myself so it's not a put down to pvp but it's just the plain truth.
You are federation or Kdf whether you want to or not. That's why in many missions you are addressed as Kdf or Fed by npcs you use their starbases they are on your planet and you can go to theirs etc, etc.
[/SIGPIC]
I did do some looking for Writing Guides on the series (TOS/TNG) This is rather a lot of surprising blogs and sources - for example I did not realize that Roddenberry was fairly strongly opposed to Diane Duane's book series - going so far to ask to have "Star Trek" removed from it....initially the Romulans are for all intents and purposes the Red Chinese portion of Star Trek (the Klingons being the Russians).....I am assuming that this is known though when I have talked to my sons they seemed perplexed by this...here is a descriptor of the Romulans from the link provided below....(btw I am not saying this right or wrong but does explain some of this...)The Romulan Star Empire lies between the Klingon Empire and the United Federation of Planets. This position is a tenuous one, and has caused much hardship on the people of the Empire in the times that the Klingons and the Federation were at war.
The governmental structure of the Romulan Star Empire is a tri-cameral system, with nearly equal power divided among the following branches: the Praetorite, the Senate, and the Tal Shi'ar. Each of these has a specific duty in the Empire and each serves as a check and balance on the others to insure that no one else has more power than the others think they should have. This setup is similar to the Chinese form of government, insuring that no one office or person becomes too powerful and upsets the delicate balance of power.
The hereditary Praetorite is the judicial branch of the Empire. They write and enforce the laws and control the Star Navy, the military arm of the Empire. While the office is lifelong, people have been removed from office for non compliance with the Empire and other various crimes. Such people usually do not live very long after removal from office, if at all. The Senate is in charge of legislating the laws of the Empire and making sure that the people pay their taxes. This office is also hereditary and carries a lifelong term. These offices correlate to the lifelong offices of the Chinese government, though they are not generally hereditary.
The Tal Shi'ar, the intelligence gathering arm of the Empire, is a very thorough organization, considered the best in the galaxy. They are ruthless in their loyalty to the Empire and have ways of finding out information that would impress most of the known galactic governments. This branch of government is generally given free rein in their work, as the citizens of the Empire do not wish to be arrested for trumped up charges of treason for their interference. Similarly, the Chinese intelligence corps is known for its torture methods and is a feared tormentor.
The Romulan Star Empire is an aggressive enemy of the United Federation of Planets. Their first contact was when a Starfleet exploration vessel entered their system, setting off a perimeter alarm of satellites.[4] This frightened the peoples of the twin planets, evoking memories of the pirates that had originally caused them to break away from their mother-world of Vulcan. This ship named the planets Romulus and Remus, after the two Roman children raised by wolves.[5]
The second encounter was no better, and by that time the Romulans had re-established space travel, and launched a full-scale attack on the invaders. This led to an all-out war. The Romulans soon discovered the technology of warp drives from destroyed Starfleet ships and adapting that technology for their own ships.
This war ended when the United Federation of Planets took the advice of the Vulcan Ambassador, Sarek, to end the war and "close the door on them", meaning for the Federation to leave them alone and ignore them.[6] The treaty to end the war was the only one in Federation history to be completed solely by data transmission, and the Federation never got a glimpse of a live R omulan, only dead and vacuum-damaged ones. This peace treaty, named The Treaty of Alpha Trianguli,[7] established the Romulan Neutral Zone, and has remained intact since the signing. While there were breaches in the Zone, none of them were sufficient to lead to a war between the Romulan Star Empire and the United Federation of Planets.
Currently, Ambassador Spock is addressing a movement in the Empire to return to the Vulcan philosophy and way of life. This movement was set back by a Senator Pardek and his actions with the Praetorite, but continues to be an underground revolution. While the initial response to this is unclear, the Federation hopes to contact this movement again in the future.[8]
In the past seventy years, the Romulan Empire and the Klingon Empire have had two major wars, with the Klingons winning the first.[9] This war led to the development of an economic dependence on the Klingons for weapons and ships and led to an economic depression in the Romulan Empire. This action led to a very strong dislike for Klingons and their goods, since it is commonly said that the lowest bidder gets the market in Klingons arms deals.[10] Whether this idea is true is up to the reader, but evidence proves that Klingon weapons and ships are prone to disaster.
This war between the Klingons and Romulans closely resembles the problems between the Soviets and the Chinese following the death of Stalin. By 1963, the two countries were exchanging insults across their shared border and engaging in competition for Communist leadership on the planet. This split replaced the original Soviet face for Communism and added the Chinese ideology.[11]
The second war between the Romulans and the Klingons ended in the Romulan's favor, ending the economic dependence on Klingon technology and leading to a seventy-year isolationist period where the Empire tried to recuperate from the loses entailed during the two wars. Currently the two Empires are at an uneasy peace, as the Klingons are now an ally of the Federation, due to the destruction of Praxis's moon and the peace treaty of Khitomer that followed.[12] The Romulan Empire and the Federation are also at an uneasy period of peace, although it is unknown how long this truce will last.
http://www.stwww.com/papers/coldwar.html
On the other tentacle, one does wonder if there shouldn't be some changes in the story in the wake of the death of Hakeev and the kidnap of the Empress. Whoever was Hakeev's second is now in charge of the Tal Shiar faction - and that person might actually be loyal to the Star Empire, rather than his/her own ambitions, which could change things radically in the Psi Velorum sector, if not the entire Alpha Quadrant.
The idea that the all other branches of the romulan government were destroyed in the hobus incedent or swore fealty to the tal'shiar or defected to the republic is laughable at best (no disrespect meant). Though the capital for the military and senate were on Romulus it was still a empire, Meaning that there were other worlds and failsafes in place sure it would be a major setback but not a total collapse.
Every government today doesn't have all their soldiers and politicians in the capital without a backup plan in case of a disaster. No matter if they use the judicial, executive, legislative system or not. there is a chain of command with other members of the government and armed forces spread out to carry on the fight and assume new responsibilities if necessary. And the Governments even in the worst disaster today wouldn't let the intelligence agencies assume absolute control over the entire countries.
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Empires, especially, tend to be centralized, as a means of curbing the ambitions of the lesser members of government. When it can take days or weeks for messengers to pass between the capital and the outlying provinces, too much authority given to provincial governors can lead to rebellion. (That's why Lord Vader was aboard Tarkin's Death Star in Star Wars, and why provincial governors in Pournelle's Empire of Man have to have served in the Imperial Navy and be personally trusted by the Emperor - in each case, it kept significant military resources under the control of people personally loyal to the Emperor himself.) This is particularly important in empires where there are outlying "barbarians" who might tempt the governors into changing allegiance. The Romulan Star Empire can only be kept under control if the central government has a tight grip on everything - and you can't do that when the Imperial government is scattered to several worlds. From a defensive standpoint, it makes sense, but from an imperialist standpoint, it's foolish.
(Why is it that no one questions the potential collapse of the Klingon Empire after Praxis, but when it's the Romulans it's suddenly unbelievable?)
The romulans had a very strict paranoid at times isolationist policy but they weren't stupid sure there was a strong presence in the capital system but they also had a strong presence in other planets of their empire and as for barbarians in outer territories the romulans didn't put up with upstart species much in their population except using them as slave labor since they viewed them as lower species much less be tempted by bribes (only exception being the reman insurrection).
To compare the governing system of the galactic empire in starwars to that in trek with the romulans is apples to oranges but I won't even touch that further.
To keep with the theme though. Ancient rome as a capital was lost but the roman empire went on for hundreds of years with a new capital in Constantinople before it's ultimate collapse. More recently though Before the sacking of Washington in the war of 1812 that you mentioned, the American capital of Philadelphia was captured by General Howe in the revolutionary war but it didn't crush the rebellion or the continental army as it wasn't all in the capital.
Point i'm stating is that beyond dispute is cryptic left some holes in the romulan plot just like they did with the Federation/Klingon war and that they based this faction mostly around pvp (red vs blue) to keep the status quo of a war plot that didn't make any sense in the first place.
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Here, in the second half of the post, I explain how important the Romulus system is, and point out the American/Canadian centric irregularity that is strong decentralization.
Jonsills also explains the level of centralization.
Even more explination of the level of centralization on the RSE.
Now, I would further point out that the Romulans had no reason make such failsafes in regard to system annhilation. Why should they? Have any groups they normally deal with throw around systems designed to annhilation entire solar systems? I'm sure there are a few, but none that I am aware of deployed by any of the political powers. The closest might be the Genesis device, but as far as we've seen, the knowledge of how to build and deploy that device is only held by the Federation (maybe) and even the Romulans are not so paranoid to think the Feds would use such a weapon.
And you're right they had failsafes for evacuating the system. But evacuating a system takes a long time. Part of the reasons the Hobbes disaster was so bad was they thought they had years to plan and carry out the evacuation of the system, but the wave of destruction propogated much faster than anticipated due to it not following the rules of physics. Remember, a supernova is a pure realspace phenominon. Even assuming the wave propagates at the speed of light (which seems unlikely) you'd have years before it reached the system. But then it did something completely unexpected, entered subspace and expanded at FTL speeds, which caught everyone off guard.
To put this into real world terms, this is the same as a hurricane threatening a coastline and being a week away, giving everyone plenty of time to prepare and evacuate and then it suddenly teleporting from where it is over the ocean right on top of a city in its full might. It makes no scientific or rational sense, there was nothing that anyone could do to prepare for it, and everyone was caught with their pants down. You might as well be dealing with a Q for all the rationality that's involved.
So they couldn't prepare, they were still making the plans to prepare, discussing the various ideas and choosing the best one. The only people with a clue as to it being irregular were Spock and Nero, who tried implimenting a plan to carry it out, and the Vulcans understandably had trouble believing that a supernova was acting in such an illogical way.
I'll post more on the China/Romulan connection later. It's true, but to only look at things through a Cold War lens isn't fair to the setting and ignores many other parrallels between the Romulans and other Earth cultures.
A brutal and sad truth Cryptic needs to change >.<
Fascinating **** here
Sort of agree, there would be many sub-factions tho the Senate likely was indeed a total(near total) loss. Romulans were far more centralized than the other major factions. All roads led to Romulus to modify an old phrase.
One of the things that contributed to the fall of the Byzantine Empire was its strong centralized system, esp in regards to troop training and manufacture of weapons. They just couldnt get out to the front fast enough and the outer reaches were TRIBBLE poorly defended, and nearly incapable of mounting effective fighting forces while they waited on the Elites from Constantinople like the Kataphractoi cavalry.
Actually its worse than that, its stated in the game that the explosion GAINED in power with every planet it destroyed. Not only did it travel at warp speeds it was stronger, not weaker, when it hit the homeworlds. So your teleporting hurricane is Cat3 before the teleport and Cat5 after. That said, the incident did take a few days before it struck Romulus and Remus, while the tragedy was still insane, a government can do an impressive amount of evacuating VIPs in 24hrs