Question Regarding the Bird of Prey

[Nerys Myk]

I heard it was "lost" on purpose.

[Dukhat]

plynch wrote:

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And didn't they use D-7s in "Enterprise Incident" b/c they couldn't find the original "bird" model? Read that somewhere.

Nerys Myk wrote:

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I heard it was "lost" on purpose.

The real reason had partly to do with the first quote and nothing to do with the second. But mostly it had to do with economics.

The Romulan vessel model was only ever used in "Balance of Terror." Any subsequent episodes where it was featured was just stock footage from BoT.

For whatever reason, they did not have possession of the model by the beginning of the third season, but they had just budgeted for the building of the Klingon Battlecruiser. However, the first episode of the third season televised was "The Enterprise Incident," and they needed three Romulan ships for that. There wasn't enough in the budget to build yet another model right after the new battlecruiser, so they basically used the new Klingon ship and added a vague line to the script saying that the Romulan were using "Klingon designs." It's as simple as that.

[TIN_MAN]

The origin of the term "Bird of prey" to refer to the TOS Romulan ship comes from its use for the AMT model kit of same.

[Red Ranger]

Nerys Myk wrote:

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Since the term was never used in TOS to describe the Romulan ship ( only its markings) calling the Klingon ship in TSFS is not 100 percent wrong or inconsistant. The implication from Stiles comment is that every Romulan ship seen in the Romulan War had this marking. Its unlikely that all Romulan ships were of the same design. Its an "national identifier" like a red star on a Soviet aircraft. It reflects the ships origin not its type.

OTOH the type ship seen in TSFS may actually be called "Bird of Prey" in Klingonese as well as some other alpha-numeric designation. From a visual standpoint it looks more like a Klingon design anyway. Romulans might also have ships they call "Birds of Prey" in their language. Ditto for "Warbirds". Perhaps thats why such terms use qualifiers like "Romulan" or "Klingon" when mentioned in Federation Standard.

KingDaniel wrote:

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It was a popular "fanon" idea in the 90's that Klingons got cloaking devices and Bird-of-Prey ships in exchange for giving the Romulans battle cruisers.

Star Trek XI featured Klingon D7's decloaking during the Kobayashi Maru test in 2258, and surrounding the Nerada a 2233 deleted scene.

Enterprise gave the Suliban cloaking technology from the 27th(-ish) century. It also retconned Romulan cloaking tech from "scary and new" in TOS to "they always had them" in 2152.

Klingon ships being called "Warbirds" was supposedly a mistake in Enterprise, despite their winged design. The term was used again in STXI.

Oh, and there's an old-style Romulan Bird of Prey hidden in the background of the Nerada's giant landing area, along with the Vulcan ship from First Contact.

So: the words "Battle cruiser", "Bird of Prey" and "Warbird" are pretty much interchangable for Klingon and Romulan ships.

I think you fellows nailed it. It's obvious that in TSFS, the Klingon ship is called a "Klingon bird of prey." I would assume that on Q'onos, they have birds of prey, so it's entirely legitimate. Also, it's never stated that all Klingon ships are called, "bird of prey," just the design seen in TSFS and in other ST shows.

From TSFS, we know that Klingons use the differentiating term, "battle cruiser" to describe Enterprise, and probably Klingon ships of similar size and firepower.

Also, I'd say the phrase "warbird" might be a synonym for "bird of prey" to both Romulans and Klingons.

This is a case of behind-the-scenes inconsistency -- which makes me wonder how either Christophr Lloyd or Edward James Olmos would've looked in Romulan makeup -- but it doesn't mean the phrases can't be reconciled. I have no problem with it.

[Timo]

Also, I'd say the phrase "warbird" might be a synonym for "bird of prey" to both Romulans and Klingons.

Actually, since those terms are used in parallel, and never for the same ship class, I'd suggest there's a very definite difference between them - just like there's a difference between "destroyer" and "cruiser".

Birds of Prey might be at the smaller end of the ship spectrum for any given era, while Warbirds are the absolute top predators. And Raptors could be small torpedo boats with even more limited capabilities than those of a Bird of Prey. This would hold for all eras of Klingon warship design, and for all eras of Romulan warship design, although of course a Warbird from the 22nd century would probably be smaller and weaker than a Bird of Prey from the 24th, and a Romulan Warbird might be stronger or weaker than her Klingon equivalent at any given time. But the choice of terminology would depend on the speaker, and the listener, and the interpreter...

(A Soviet skipper from the 1970s would not have spoken of "destroyers" in his native language, but an interpreter might have turned the word he used into English in several ways: "squadronship" if he insisted on perverting the guy's words into the literal translation of the pre-Soviet term for destroyer, "destroyer" if he insisted on perverting the guy's words into the NATO equivalent for the vessel type, and "large ASW ship" if he agreed to a truly literal translation. The English listener would choose what he wants to hear based on his profession and background, too.)

Timo Saloniemi

[plynch]

Dukhat wrote:

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For whatever reason, they did not have possession of the model by the beginning of the third season

Was it repo'd? I KNEW they were on a smaller budget in S3, but that is just sad.

[ClawsThatCatch]

You guys are great! Thanks for the clarification!

[ssosmcin]

Just that, for me, "Bird of Prey" never sounded very Klingon to me. It always felt like it suggested a bird hunting and stalking its kill, waiting for the right moment to strike. IN Trek terms, Romulans creeping up under cloak, then revealing themselves long enough to swoop in for the kill. Klingons, on the other hand, just go in and conquer or blast the shit out of you, so "Battle Cruiser" seemed more appropriate.

But, yeah, with TSFS, the damage was done, and future Trek's ran with it. Klingons didn't get "warbirds" until the Abrams Trek movie. Until then, it was a huge, Next Gen era Romulan ship.

[Dukhat]

plynch wrote:

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Was it repo'd? I KNEW they were on a smaller budget in S3, but that is just sad.

AFAIK, no one knows what happened to the model.

[King Daniel]

Some vague points that I don't think have come up are vaguely related:
Some fans (as well as old FASA manuals) also believed the Klingon Bird-of-Prey was a Romulan design being used by Klingons, presumably as part of the battle cruiser/cloaking device deal. Enterprise later gave Klingon's a near-identical bird-of-prey at the end of season 2, about a century earlier.

The similarities in the K and R ships could still be explained by a technological exchange, just bump it back long before Enterprise. Otherwise surely Romulan ships would/should resemble Vulcan ones?

It's always seemed weird to me that Klingons and Romulans both have green ships. With Romulans it makes sense: Romulan blood is green, and they want to appear scary. With Klingons...they want to scare Romulans?

[Lieut. Arex]

Perhaps entirely Romulan designs do. The D'deridex's open center recalls the ringship designs used for the Vulcans in ENT and the aft hulls of the ships from TNG's "Unification". Don't forget, the Romulan cruiser in "Balance of Terror" looks as it does because, according to the script, it was based on UFP designs, essentially a saucer section with warp nacelles attached.

[Timo]

Klingons, on the other hand, just go in and conquer or blast the shit out of you, so "Battle Cruiser" seemed more appropriate.

To be sure, Klingon ships in TOS always played sneaky and dirty tricks. There was no "simple blasting" in any of the episodes, really.

In "Errand of Mercy", our introduction to the Klingon species sounds very much like an attack by a cloak-capable Bird of Prey: an enemy appears from nowhere, completely surprises our heroes despite them being on war alert, and launches a volley of torpedoes which all score perfect hits. The Enterprise shrugs off the hits, responds with a phaser blast, and the enemy is immediately dust.

Whenever Klingon Warbirds (sorry, battle cruisers) confront our heroes, they either yield ("Trouble with Tribbles", TOS-R "Friday's Child", "Time Trap"), or rely on saboteurs ("Elaan of Troyius") or strange superweapons ("More Tribbles, More Troubles") or superior numbers (TOS-R "Errand of Mercy", STXI simulation). Gorkon's flagship in ST6 is a rare exception to the rule, a bravely acting single Warbird...

Klingon ships also all tend to look like birds (wings, neck, head), while the original Romulan one did not.

Timo Saloniemi

[sbk1234]

KingDaniel wrote:

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It's always seemed weird to me that Klingons and Romulans both have green ships. With Romulans it makes sense: Romulan blood is green, and they want to appear scary. With Klingons...they want to scare Romulans?

So, in TUC, should the Klingons have been flying pink ships? That would have made an impression!

[Nerys Myk]

sbk1234 wrote:

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So, in TUC, should the Klingons have been flying pink ships? That would have made an impression!

Koloth would have loved it.

[Therin of Andor]

A beaker full of death wrote:

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TSFS was originally supposed to include Romulans. The producers at some point said, "who ever heard of Romulans," so they changed it to Klingons. They didn't bother changing the ship.

No, since the movie featured Vulcans such as Saavik, Sarek, T'Lar and Young Spock, aliens with slanted eyebrows and pointed ears, there was concern that the general public would be confused if the movie's antagonists were seemingly identical in appearance. They knew the movie's storyline wouldn't permit an elaborate backstory for the origin of Romulans, so it was easier to switch the enemy race to Klingons, especially since a large number of expensive Klingon leather uniforms were in storage since ST:TMP. Since TOS had already established that there had been a tech exchange by the two powers (ie. Romulans using Klingon vessels - mainly because the Season One Romulan vessel had been lost/stolen/broken), there wasn't need for further elaboration.

There was a stage note in the ST III script that wasn't used in the final draft, where Kruge was a Klingon lord who'd stolen a Romulan bird of prey:
eg.

"Trek buffs will recognize" its "distinctive bird & wing motif".

I have an old blog entry on this here:
http://therinofandor.blogspot.com/20...mas-while.html

KingDaniel wrote:

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Some fans (as well as old FASA manuals) also believed the Klingon Bird-of-Prey was a Romulan design being used by Klingons, presumably as part of the battle cruiser/cloaking device deal.

This is specified in the above script extract.