Did we know about the Borg sooner?

[AllStarEntprise]

KingDaniel wrote:

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^The 29th century time cops in "Relativity" called First Contact a "pogo paradox", where interference to prevent an event is what causes that event to happen.

Therefore, there was only the one version of Cochrane's flight and Enterprise was "always" the past of TOS and TNG. It's a (big) out-of-universe retcon, not an in-universe altered timeline.

But remember the ENT-E crew saw the 24th Century Borg Earth while they were in the temporal wake following the Borg Sphere. That means in one timeline the Borg succeeded in assimilating Earth. The ENT-E prevented this timeline by destroying the Borg and restoring enough of their recorded history to what it should resemble. No doubt their presence made this timeline of 2063 different moving forward. With VOY 'Relativity' 7 of 9 has recollection of both timeline of events. The future where the Borg succeeded in assimilating Earth and the future where the ENT-E prevented the assimilation. It's impossible for her to know about both of these, and it can't be a paradox if it was destined that the Borg would both succeed and fail in the same time travel endeavor. Chock that up to another Voyager writing staff goof. Just press the reset button and it'll all seem alright.

[King Daniel into Darkness]

Seven knows about it because of the signal sent at the end of "Relativity" - that's the whole reason that bit was included, to fix the continuity error of her knowing about the Borg being present at First Contact. Otherwise there is no way she could have had that knowledge.

And as I said, the Pogo Paradox is attempted interference to prevent an event being the catalyst of the event they were trying to stop. The Borg caused the change in Earth's past, making the Enterprise follow and undo it. That sequence of events is what "always" happened (in-universe) in Treks timeline. A loop involvong a change and an undo.

Don't get me wrong, it makes very little sense as does all sci-fi time travel. But I take the in-universe explanation from the guys in the future (+ENT's out-of-universe retcons) over the idea Enterprise is an altered history, which renders it moot as a prequel and ruins it's tie-ins to the later series' and movies.

[Finn]

^No. Seven knows because she was still in the collective when First Contact happened...

[Timo]

There's no reason to conclude that the Hansen's just randomly happened upon the information about the Borg.

Why not? Are we ruling out the credibility or indeed possibility of Sasquatch hunting in the 24th century? That sounds like an awfully arbitrary limitation on the Star Trek universe.

We the audience know that the Borg are kind of important and very real. The citizens of the 24th century Federation should not have knowledge of either sort. They should retain the right to treat the Borg as a hobby project or a myth of limited interest. And so, really, should Starfleet.

Timo Saloniemi

[King Daniel into Darkness]

The thing from the Bayou wrote:

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^No. Seven knows because she was still in the collective when First Contact happened...

Yet the Borg in 2063 were out of contact with the collective, hence them trying (and failing) to convert the Enterprise's deflector into a transmitter. So there's no way Seven or the other Borg of the 24th century would know how First Contact played out. But they did - because the FC survoivors sent their dignal in "Regeneration"

[Timo]

Or then the Borg of ST:FC already sent out all sorts of messages, but those were of a fairly slow-moving type (or even "time capsule" type immobile messages, to be discovered later) and failed in the task of summoning immediate help from the 21st century Collective... But did eventually get the information to the 24th century Collective, without the help of the 22nd century interlude.

Timo Saloniemi

[Finn]

KingDaniel wrote:

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Yet the Borg in 2063 were out of contact with the collective, hence them trying (and failing) to convert the Enterprise's deflector into a transmitter. So there's no way Seven or the other Borg of the 24th century would know how First Contact played out. But they did - because the FC survoivors sent their dignal in "Regeneration"

Moments before the temporal vortex opens up over Earth...

Borg Queen: Launch sphere. Set course for 2063 and destroy the Phoenix, Earth's first warp ship, before the Enterprise follows us in

Every drone in the galaxy (including seven): Acknowledged...

[AllStarEntprise]

The thing from the Bayou wrote:

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Moments before the temporal vortex opens up over Earth...

Borg Queen: Launch sphere. Set course for 2063 and destroy the Phoenix, Earth's first warp ship, before the Enterprise follows us in

Every drone in the galaxy (including seven): Acknowledged...

Remember in VOY 'Relativity' 7 of 9 has knowledge of 2 different scenarios for the same time travel incursion. She states that the Borg traveled back to 2063 to stop Cochram from breaking the warp barrier, and to assimilate earth. She also states the Borg succeeded. Now we the audience and the crew of the ENT-E saw this when the Borg Sphere travelled through the temporal wake. We saw the Borg rewrite history in their own image. In this timeline the Borg traveled back 310 years and literally changed history in front of our eyes and the ENT-E crews eyes with respect to the 24th century.

HOWEVER 7 of 9 then follows up her admission of the Borg succeeding in their goal. With testimony to their subsequent failure to assimilate earth and stop Cochram due to the intervention of the ENT-E to restore history to as close as it could be to what the Federation has recorded.

I've posted this before so I'll say it again. How can 7 of 9 know about both of these events? It can't be a pogo paradox/casualty loop/ predestination paradox that the Borg would both succeed and fail in their goal. Because we saw it. The Borg succeeded in assimilating Earth. The ENT-E still existing to stop them was a stroke of luck because being a Federation starship it couldn't exist in a reality where the Fed never existed. The Borg trying to create a transmitter to contact the Borg is the Delta Quad. means they weren't successful in getting their situation of presence know to 21st century Borg.

This is a scenario where the writers on VOY made a mistake. The Borg couldn't have both succeeded and failed and yet somehow it all be a paradox that it happened. I suspect the VOY writers thought it would be clever to try and pass this off. Hence the time police guy's line to 7 of 9 that in a way the Fed owes it's existence to the Borg. No it doesn't. The Fed owes it's continued but varied existence to the ENT-E crew for restoring history. Just like the people TOS, TNG, DS9 and VOY eras owe their continued but varied existence to Kirk and co. for bringing the whales from 20th century Earth to the future to stop the whale probe from destroying Earth.

The events of First Contact should technically push Enterprise in to an alternate reality. With the Borg Drones left over in the artic region of Earth and all. Make sense really, the events of FC creating an alternate timeline that is subtly different but close enough to the original timeline where the first contact with the Borg was 'Q Who' and not ENT's 'Regeneration'.

[AllStarEntprise]

Sorry double post

[King Daniel into Darkness]

Wait, wasn't Seven being tested by Ducane on her knowledge of temporal whatevers when she spoke of both First Contact timelines? In that case, she probably got the complete picture from the USS Relativity's computers. They'd trained her before sending her back in time.

Prior to "Relativity", Seven said only that "the Borg were present during those events" (referring to First Contact) in "Year of Hell" - something implying first-hand info (i.e. from the message sent by the "Regeneration" survivors) rather than some collective-wide Spacebook update posted by the queen seconds before plunging into the time vortex. After all, someone like Seven wouldn't say the Borg WERE present if the last she knew was a plan to maybe hopefully if successful perhaps alter history.

[Therin of Andor]

AllStarEntprise wrote:

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We can confirm that the Borg were very much in Federation space long before the their attack on earth in TNG BOBW.

Who says El-Auria was in Federation space?

According to the novelization and an onscreen graphic, one of the ships bringing El-Aurian refugees to Earth was the SS Robert Fox (named for an ambassador featured in TOS), so it and the SS Lakul were perhaps Federation ships, not El-Aurian, but the Borg may have attacked and scattered Guinan's people many decades earlier, and a small group of survivors was finally making its way to a planet Guinan had visited before.

[Oso Blanco]

AllStarEntprise wrote:

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The events of First Contact should technically push Enterprise in to an alternate reality. With the Borg Drones left over in the artic region of Earth and all. Make sense really, the events of FC creating an alternate timeline that is subtly different but close enough to the original timeline where the first contact with the Borg was 'Q Who' and not ENT's 'Regeneration'.

That's what I've been saying all along! Enterprise being set in an alternate timeline because of what happened in First Contact would be a logical way to explain away all the discrepancies between Enterprise and TOS/TNG.

I'd even go a step further and say that Star Trek XI is a continuation of the alternate timeline that Enterprise happened in. This would be the only way I can think of to explain the differences to the original timeline in that movie. The differences that were not caused by Nero.

[King Daniel into Darkness]

But then Enterprise becomes utterly pointless as a prequel! Star Trek XI was intended to be a reboot/alternate reality thing, but Enterprise was always supposed to be a prequel to TOS/TNG and the rest.

What's the point of showing the start of the Coalition/Federation of Planets in "Demons"/"Terra Prime" if it's not THE Federation, but some alternate? Why explain the Klingon foreheads changing if that's not setting up the Klingons of The Original Series? Why make a huge fuss and intergalactic incident over the first Vulcan/human hybrid if not to forshadow Spock?

[Psion]

KingDaniel wrote:

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But then Enterprise becomes utterly pointless as a prequel! Star Trek XI was intended to be a reboot/alternate reality thing, but Enterprise was always supposed to be a prequel to TOS/TNG and the rest.

What's the point of showing the start of the Coalition/Federation of Planets in "Demons"/"Terra Prime" if it's not THE Federation, but some alternate? Why explain the Klingon foreheads changing if that's not setting up the Klingons of The Original Series? Why make a huge fuss and intergalactic incident over the first Vulcan/human hybrid if not to forshadow Spock?

It was just as entertaining whether it was showing the history of TOS, the history of JJ's Trek, or the history of an altogether different universe that might play out quite differently by the time the 23rd century rolled around. The nice thing about taking that route (if the writers had actually planned it that way -- I advocated this idea back when Enterprise first started airing) is that it gives you the same toys to play with, but there's still suspense because everything could play out differently.

[King Daniel into Darkness]

The stand alone episodes? Yeah, continuity doesn't really matter. But the ones that deal with Trek mythology or are direct prequels of course need to tie into the other series' in order to be effective.