TNG Child Endangerment?

[BillJ]

Why would the saucer need a "reason" to fall out of warp in "Brothers"? Forcing the saucer to fall out of warp is the point of the entire exercise - it's a bit of sabotage our heroes want to inflict on Data. It really need not be a standard feature of the design, and is not stated to be.

The saucer falls out of warp. The star drive section has nothing to do with it.

 

[Nakita Akita]

Oops.

Though 51 minutes is almost an insignificant amount of time given what must have been interstellar distances...

I guess one of the other options is possible, though I thought Farpoint was supposed to be a bit out of the way?

Yeah, it's been awhile since I rewatched this one...

51 minutes?
Sounds like they stopped at a drive through for some snacks.

 

[Antonovus]

Think of the psychological issues that might arise from perhaps perpetual familial separation.

 

[Nakita Akita]

Think of the psychological issues that might arise from perhaps perpetual familial separation.

Well, since I'm sure you, as all of us, can simply look around your neighborhood and see it, yep.

 

[saladdays]

Or then the saucer simply traveled at warp, which is a capacity it is never said to lack.

It's pretty clear that for at least a Starfleet ship to travel at warp speed, it requires a warp core. We never hear of there being a separate warp core of any kind housed in the saucer section of the Enterprise-D. Unless you are suggesting there is some type of warp drive system that we have never seen or heard anyone talk about, there simply isn't one (and with all the possible warp core breaches and such that have occurred with the E-D, you think we would have known if there was a separate one on board, right?).

And then there's the nacelles question I posed before. What Starfleet warpship does not have some type of nacelles?

 

[USS Firefly]

Maybe a stupid question, but could a couple of shuttles or a Runabout warp tow the saucer section?

 

[BillJ]

51 minutes?
Sounds like they stopped at a drive through for some snacks.

Like the rest of Trek, "...Farpoint" ships moved at the speed of plot.

 

[Arpy]

Maybe a stupid question, but could a couple of shuttles or a Runabout warp tow the saucer section?

Not a stupid question. Often one imagines those dozens of warp cores in shuttles could have come in extremely handy, offering power for years. Or transporters, or weapons, or replicators, etc etc

 

[JesterFace]

This is the first time I've heard that the saucer section would be able to travel at warp speed on its own.

If it was, it should have a warpcore of its own to create a warpfield.
If the saucer had a warpcore, why wouldn't the crew use its power for some other systems? We've heard things like "reroute the power from this and that to the shields" or something. Another warpcore has never been talked about. If there is one, which I don't think there is, there must be some secret rule that power from the other core is rerouted to other systems automatically without anyone giving an order.

I have never noticed another warpcore on the Enterprise-D when looking through the blueprints.

Basically, a saucer separation at warp would tear the saucer apart?
There would be no warpfield to keep the "dune effect" in place on which the warptech is based upon?
Basically the ship moves from place to another faster that light without traveling faster than light by shrinking space in front of the ship and then expanding it behind it, right? Am I getting this right?

What if the saucer is ripped away from this effect because it has no warpbubble?

But a lot can happen it the world of scifi. Maybe the saucer can use a "residual" leftover from the warpcore for a while after separation? Saucer can't create a warpfield but it can maintain one, somehow, for a limited time?

whoops, did I go off topic.....

 

[BillJ]

Basically, a saucer separation at warp would tear the saucer apart?
There would be no warpfield to keep the "dune effect" in place on which the warptech is based upon?

In Star Trek, apparently you can "fall" out of warp.

 

[Arpy]

There has to be some residual warp effect or something, I think. If not, the saucer is a sitting duck.

 

[BillJ]

There has to be some residual warp effect or something, I think. If not, the saucer is a sitting duck.

They said in "Brothers", that the saucer would fall out of warp within two minutes of separation. So, I guess that is your residual effect.

 

[Paul Weaver]

There was no failure of the galaxy program. That’s fan service I think

Depends how many they built and how much stock you put in the TM, but there were three hull losses in the first 8 years, and we didn’t see any newer ships with families on board.

 

[Arpy]

They said in "Brothers", that the saucer would fall out of warp within two minutes of separation. So, I guess that is your residual effect.

EaF already showed the saucer traveling at the speed of the plot. Now you have me thinking that the “Brothers” scenario is what happens during a “forced” separation vs a harmonious one in which both hulls act in concert during the maneuver.

I don’t really care how it happens. Maybe the fusion reactors alone can low-warp “coast” the saucer away from the danger.

 

[Greg Cox]

M-5 put the kibosh on that idea.

V'Gr almost destroying Earth didn't help.

Seriously, the families on board thing makes sense if this is really a "Wagon Train" scenario where the Enterprise is embarked on a long-term exploratory mission into the final frontier and regular visits home are not an option.

This reasoning is undermined if, in fact, the Enterprise can zip back to Earth over a commercial break or, worse yet, if a Thanksgiving dinner at Grandma's house on Earth is only a long shuttle ride away.

In retrospect, a better option might have been to occasionally have the ship transporting a load of colonists on a one-way trip to a distant frontier planet. Then you'd have kids and families aboard when the plot needed them, but they wouldn't be a regular thing that you needed to think about every episode.

 

[Arpy]

Depends how many they built and how much stock you put in the TM, but there were three hull losses in the first 8 years, and we didn’t see any newer ships with families on board.

No.

The TM is not canon or “canon.” The shows pick and choose what is. There are other “official” TM’s; they’re not canon either and have also been contradicted by what’s on screen.

The Federation (and likely any power of your choice) lost a lot more ships than three in those eight years, and most weren’t Galaxy Class.

The Yamato was lost to superalien tech that if not for a Galaxy Class would have destroyed a D’deridex also.

The Odyssey went into danger without non-essential personnel, lasted longer than most ships would have, against a millennia-old super-empire, one that had been spying on the Federation for some time, succeeded in its mission, was only destroyed by a kamikaze attack of a large ship (in the episode), and only blew up after drifting a moment even after that. It was a beast.

The Enterprise was lost to spy tech with no(?) casualties.

We have no idea how many ships (Galaxy, bigger, or otherwise) are out there with or without families.

We do know that the Galaxys were heavily featured during the Dominion War, none were seen destroyed, and some were seen kicking serious ass.

We know that Admiral Riker was still cruising in the old Galaxy Class Enterprise in AGT, and Captain La Forge commanding a maybe newer one on VOY.

And we know that, out-of-universe, TNG’s ratings remained higher than other Trek series on at the same time. I think some of that comes from the promise of the future represented by things like families in space.

 

[Tenacity]

We do know that the Galaxys were heavily featured during the Dominion War, none were seen destroyed

One.

 

[gakelly]

I like the fact that children aboard the Enterprise have access to play in the observation lounge.

 

[Timo]

It's pretty clear that for at least a Starfleet ship to travel at warp speed, it requires a warp core. We never hear of there being a separate warp core of any kind housed in the saucer section of the Enterprise-D. Unless you are suggesting there is some type of warp drive system that we have never seen or heard anyone talk about, there simply isn't one (and with all the possible warp core breaches and such that have occurred with the E-D, you think we would have known if there was a separate one on board, right?).

I really don't see the situation arising that we would hear of there being a warp core aboard. I mean, we never learn whether there's a sickbay aboard a specific section, or a holodeck, or whatever. If it goes to warp (as the saucer does), we can safely presume there's a means for it to do so.

Compare to Voyager, say. There Sternbach again says something about the specs of the ship that never materializes as a plot point: it has two warp cores. But this time, we can see both of them in the MSD! Yet plots involving one warp core going down or getting stolen never make mention of the spare. So there we are forced to go to some effort to explain to ourselves how and why Rick was wrong. No such difficulty with saucer warp!

And then there's the nacelles question I posed before. What Starfleet warpship does not have some type of nacelles?

Well, the Defiant, obviously. The Galaxy saucer has a lot more blue glow to show for her warp abilities.

The ship's auxiliaries likewise lack nacelles. Both types, and the mothership, have what might charitably be considered cowlings. But since they already prove that size and geometry is irrelevant even to Starfleet (let alone the Federation, the various members of which readily operate nacelle-free ships all through TNG), there's no great need to argue the point. Nacelles, in the cigar shape sense or any other, simply aren't mandatory, and never have been.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Arpy]

One.

I’d like to see it. Do you remember which episode?

 

[Timo]

"Jem'Hadar"?

I mean, the war was on long before the heroes even knew there was a Dominion.

Timo Saloniemi