The Battle of Maxia
- Thread starter Unicron
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Lovely CGI, but I think the battle would be a lot more edge-of-the-seat engaging if he ships didn't saddle up beside each other.
Like the first Ferengi barrage: imagine that emanating from a tiny speck in the distance. Suddenly the screen is filled with torpedoes - who, what, where? That tiny superhot speck must be a starship - we're under attack!
And I appreciate that a lot of the action will be 'slowed down' so that we viewers can follow what's happening, but the Picard Manouevre seems to take place at around 20 mph! ENGAGE! Bimble towards the Ferrengi ship.
Like the first Ferengi barrage: imagine that emanating from a tiny speck in the distance. Suddenly the screen is filled with torpedoes - who, what, where? That tiny superhot speck must be a starship - we're under attack!
And I appreciate that a lot of the action will be 'slowed down' so that we viewers can follow what's happening, but the Picard Manouevre seems to take place at around 20 mph! ENGAGE! Bimble towards the Ferrengi ship.
LOVE IT!
The rather coarse model also only shows one set of phasers (in paired banks) on the dorsal side, omitting the second set (single ones) closer to the rim. Why is this worth mentioning? Because this is basically the only time in Trek when a character makes a distinction between "main" and "secondary" phasers - and the inclusion of the single banks would explain that bit of dialogue rather nicely...
As far as nitpicking of eye candy goes, I'd also have liked to see a more diverse selection of shuttlecraft (and perhaps warp-incapable lifeboats and other crewed flotsam being towed by them).
Timo Saloniemi
As far as nitpicking of eye candy goes, I'd also have liked to see a more diverse selection of shuttlecraft (and perhaps warp-incapable lifeboats and other crewed flotsam being towed by them).
Timo Saloniemi
The Zhao is a very interesting variant, with a distinctly Jackill flare to it. Several of his variants went with the quad nacelle approach seen here.
I believe that that is what is implied.
The trick will only work if the sensor information on the target ship travels at lesser speed than the attacking ship. In the ideal case, the target ship has lost her faster-than-light sensors (as often happens in Trek battles), so her targeting information travels at lightspeed, and any speed above warp one will do the trick. If the enemy has sensors capable of warp six, though, a warp seven dash will do. And so forth.
Naturally, in "The Battle", the E-D had not lost any sensors and should have been able to track the Stargazer effortlessly and without "visual illusions". But the whole point seemed to be that Riker wanted Picard to keep on thinking that this was the Battle of Maxia - because if Picard stopped doing that, he'd become unpredictable, and Riker would have to kill his boss. Nobody else was in danger, as the E-D could always simply have destroyed her opponent, but saving Picard required keeping up the pretense. Which is why leaving the viewscreen on "lightspeed mode" would also be informative and help Riker adapt.
(Of course, what we saw would not be what things would look like to lightspeed sensors aka the naked eye. What would be seen is one Stargazer popping in out of nowhere, and then an image of her splitting from that and receding to the distance, butt first as light from all the spots she had previously traveled through would finally arrive to the eye, nearest light first...)
It's quite in keeping with Trek space battles that Picard would know immediately when the Ferengi lost their FTL sensors. Those things are active, after all, like radar beams - so when the "radar beams" stopped hitting Picard's ship, he'd know the enemy was forced to rely on lightspeed or STL targeting. And since Picard still couldn't flee (engines down etc.), this would be his opening for an attack. And any attack would do, but a high speed dash to point blank range would minimize risk of return fire, maximize phaser power (those supposedly hurt more at close range) and hopefully also confuse the enemy a bit (although that hardly mattered, because no helmsman in Trek reacts to enemy action in a split second anyway).
Timo Saloniemi
Naturally, in "The Battle", the E-D had not lost any sensors and should have been able to track the Stargazer effortlessly and without "visual illusions". But the whole point seemed to be that Riker wanted Picard to keep on thinking that this was the Battle of Maxia - because if Picard stopped doing that, he'd become unpredictable, and Riker would have to kill his boss. Nobody else was in danger, as the E-D could always simply have destroyed her opponent, but saving Picard required keeping up the pretense. Which is why leaving the viewscreen on "lightspeed mode" would also be informative and help Riker adapt.
(Of course, what we saw would not be what things would look like to lightspeed sensors aka the naked eye. What would be seen is one Stargazer popping in out of nowhere, and then an image of her splitting from that and receding to the distance, butt first as light from all the spots she had previously traveled through would finally arrive to the eye, nearest light first...)
It's quite in keeping with Trek space battles that Picard would know immediately when the Ferengi lost their FTL sensors. Those things are active, after all, like radar beams - so when the "radar beams" stopped hitting Picard's ship, he'd know the enemy was forced to rely on lightspeed or STL targeting. And since Picard still couldn't flee (engines down etc.), this would be his opening for an attack. And any attack would do, but a high speed dash to point blank range would minimize risk of return fire, maximize phaser power (those supposedly hurt more at close range) and hopefully also confuse the enemy a bit (although that hardly mattered, because no helmsman in Trek reacts to enemy action in a split second anyway).
Timo Saloniemi
You know a similar phenomenon happens in real life. According to Einstein's General relativity our sun is big enough to bend the rays of light that come from distant stars, so that under some specific conditions it is possible if you're using a powerful telescope to see the same star in two places at once. Einstein predicted this phenomenon long before it was possible to verify it. That's what geniuses do...
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