ST Picard - Starships and Technology ADVANCE Discussion

[Timo]

With the recent reshuffling, there's no access issue. But there's a resources issue, obviously. The series will have all-new starship meshes, no two ways around it. But perhaps the short isn't worth the effort, especially as there already would have been plenty of other effort, with the kiteships, the space stations, whatnot. Bleeding material and resources from series proper to the short might be counterproductive - half-baked versions of effects, possible spoiling of designs and looks, risking delaying the first season episodes.

Still, new meshes would be sorta trivial. It's not as if the Magee or the Zimmerman would be more than fairly simple kitbashes; they don't shine as complicated and detailed foreground ships. Quickly whipping up stuff that looks halfway TNG'ish, or even uses upcoming PIC shapes, would give at least equally good results aesthetically, and better thematically.

But as said, the problem isn't with having the DSC ships in the short. It's with not having them appear in TNG or the TOS movies or indeed TOS (where did they go, in-universe?) and with nothing but them appearing in the short (where are the regular players?). The first is easily handwaved by calling them logistics ships that have no place in the foreground of TNG or TOS adventures. The second is an unfortunate failure to enrich the scenery, but not really something that calls for an extensive in-universe rationale.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[DEWLine]

Are they allowed or have access to TNG-VOY ships meshes?

They ought to, at least for Picard purposes. One hopes that once full episodes start airing, they will be using such...and mixed with newer designs.

 

[Nenya]

The mid 23rd and late 24th centuries don’t look that different. Holograms everywhere, same ships, same stupid see through screens. I’ve begun to ABSOLUTELY HATE see through screens. It doesn’t make any sense and doesn’t seem all that practical. It’s just generic future tech that many shows and movies have used. It’s played out.

 

[Dukhat]

...Ah, found the 'caps. Magee and Zimmerman, then. Makes perverse in-universe sense: utility types would have no need to keep up with the Joneses, and could remain unchanged for centuries. See Oberth.

Too bad the scenes don't insert any new types in the mix. Would it have been too difficult to use modern NEM workbees in addition with the DSC stuff? Aren't they reusing a NEM spacedock model there anyway?

No, even the spacedock is from DSC.

And if those ships are part of the Romulan evacuation fleet, then they would be in the process of construction, which makes no sense. Why are they constructing brand new ships from 150 year old designs? It’s more likely that they are just meant to be generic ships not to be taken seriously, like those DS9 kitbashes.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

Maybe those weren't operational Space Docks but Space Museums for legacy / older ships?

We do have floating museums for older vessels IRL.

It wouldn't surprise me if they left a few older SpaceDocks with older Ships moored to them.

 

[NCC-73515]

If that was the museum part of UP, it would solve the problem

 

[F. King Daniel]

Guys, they don't care. To them, it's Starfleet ships in a spacedock and nothing more.

After Discovery's semi-reboot, I'm amazed anyone is surprised by this stuff. They'll probably recycle Pike's Enterprise as the Enterprise-E. As I said in the other thread, we are living in the world Doug Drexler warned us about: Where the ENT producers wanted to use the Akira-class unchanged as the Enterprise NX-01 (and where the TMP-era K'Tinga actually was used for pre-TOS Klingon ship)

And you know what? It's not going to bother me one bit. Sometimes a Starfleet ship is a Starfleet ship.

 

[Timo]

I still doubt there's anything to Drexler's little anecdote, beyond the producers actually saying "this is cool, do something like this". I mean, it's a good story. But Drexler's paid job would be to do stuff, not to "use" it. That is, adapt the Akira for ENT. Which he did, and the "and then some" part was good for the show but not necessarily necessary.

As for building ships to a 150 yr old design, once again we appear to be getting a rather spectacular failure of seeing Utopia Planitia actually build anything. These ships are not shown to be under construction: they are fully lit, externally completed ships all. Similarly, "Relativity" showed a lot of starships, including some in states of tear-down, but none of them had modern registries appropriate for 2370s construction...

Do these things look good? They convey the message of "these are dockyards" to a degree. I can live with them doing this so very poorly, failing to insert the verisimilitude of clutter: I get my clutter from the likes of the 2009 movie or the Beyond time-lapse. And I gather the degree in the short is sufficient, as the sole, split-second role of these ships is to die, right?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[NCC-73515]

Guys, they don't care. To them, it's Starfleet ships in a spacedock and nothing more.

After Discovery's semi-reboot, I'm amazed anyone is surprised by this stuff. They'll probably recycle Pike's Enterprise as the Enterprise-E. As I said in the other thread, we are living in the world Doug Drexler warned us about: Where the ENT producers wanted to use the Akira-class unchanged as the Enterprise NX-01 (and where the TMP-era K'Tinga actually was used for pre-TOS Klingon ship)

And you know what? It's not going to bother me one bit. Sometimes a Starfleet ship is a Starfleet ship.

If they use the Discoprise and say it's the E, I'll go crazy on the spot XD
And the actors have to play along, I guess. Stewart reacting or saying how he missed his E.
The new E captain sitting in the 2250s chair on the 2250s bridge, and no one finds it funny.
I'm gonna have nightmares now

Also, I did a little research and calculations, and it seems Magee is about 50 years older then than the Miranda, Oberth and Excelsior were in TNG/DS9

 

[Timo]

Or then the Mirandas are much older than that. NCC-1864 doesn't come too much after NCC-1701, after all, and looks pretty much the same. And we saw NCC-1864 operating in "Court Martial" already - that is, we saw her registry.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Dukhat]

Maybe those weren't operational Space Docks but Space Museums for legacy / older ships?

We do have floating museums for older vessels IRL.

It wouldn't surprise me if they left a few older SpaceDocks with older Ships moored to them.

If that was the museum part of UP, it would solve the problem

What would be the strategic purpose in attacking a museum? That’s like terrorists crashing a plane into the Liberty Bell.

 

[Timo]

What was the strategic purpose of destroying the souvenir stand of the World Trade Center?

Museum ships could be collateral in an attack that in Picard's vision is literally planetwide. However, isn't the short actually more or less explicit (okay, blatantly implicit) that the kids' parents are working on the very ships we see?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Nenya]

Guys, they don't care. To them, it's Starfleet ships in a spacedock and nothing more.

After Discovery's semi-reboot, I'm amazed anyone is surprised by this stuff. They'll probably recycle Pike's Enterprise as the Enterprise-E. As I said in the other thread, we are living in the world Doug Drexler warned us about: Where the ENT producers wanted to use the Akira-class unchanged as the Enterprise NX-01 (and where the TMP-era K'Tinga actually was used for pre-TOS Klingon ship)

And you know what? It's not going to bother me one bit. Sometimes a Starfleet ship is a Starfleet ship.

It’s taken me years but I’ve finally accepted that prequels are generally a bad idea. I know people gave Enterprise a lot of hell for all of its canon “violations” but it had more wiggle room because it was set around a hundred years before TOS. Discovery shouldn’t have any wiggle room being set ten years before TOS. I wish they had called it a reboot and been done with it.

I’m different from you in that it bothers me. I grew up with Star Trek and it’s very dear to me. All of these little details confirm to me that they really don’t care. They took a lot of generic sci-fi elements, slapped some Star Trek things on it and hoped no one would notice. Is anyone involved in these shows longtime fans?

 

[Dukhat]

What was the strategic purpose of destroying the souvenir stand of the World Trade Center?

The target wasn’t the souvenir stand. But...

Museum ships could be collateral in an attack that in Picard's vision is literally planetwide. However, isn't the short actually more or less explicit (okay, blatantly implicit) that the kids' parents are working on the very ships we see?

Yes. The idea of collateral damage to a museum during an attack on a shipbuilding facility kind of goes out the window when the ships in question are clearly meant to represent the new fleet that the Picard Countdown comic has been advertising.

 

[Mark_Nguyen]

I'm not convinced of that. Perhaps the opening shots of UP were the only new space VFX shots in the show, aside from the parents standing against a green screen? The attack itself apparently uses VFX clips only from the trailers and already-released stuff, so the DSC-era ships and yard may not be seen in Picard proper (though the DSC shuttle has been seen in the trailers).

My kneejerk reaction to this is that the opening ships were indeed ancient ships being pressed into service, be it for the Romulan evacuation or some other purpose. Could they have been in the museum? Possibly - the ships and the gantry could easily both be exhibits, and similarly pressed into service. We've seen before that Starfleet isn't above using outdated tech to help the Romulans out (TNG "The Mind's Eye"), and if there are actually millions or billions of Romulans who need to move house, starting the process with every inactive ship you could muster while LaForge is building brand new ones could be prudent.

Although of course, the simplest matter is that they just used existing models in the hopes that most watchers won't even notice they were already seen in DSC, though the use of the Magee is concerning given that the ship has had a starring role in an earlier Short Trek. Perhaps they pulled an Akira and just grabbed the most detailed of the BOTBS models, which also could fit into the spacedock with the two tugs? Those two models are arguably at the top of the "most recently used" pile of models in the current era of the franchise, which smacks of slightly lazy filmmaking when there are tons of other great models with the same or less screentime.

Mark

 

[fireproof78]

Guys, they don't care. To them, it's Starfleet ships in a spacedock and nothing more.

After Discovery's semi-reboot, I'm amazed anyone is surprised by this stuff. They'll probably recycle Pike's Enterprise as the Enterprise-E. As I said in the other thread, we are living in the world Doug Drexler warned us about: Where the ENT producers wanted to use the Akira-class unchanged as the Enterprise NX-01 (and where the TMP-era K'Tinga actually was used for pre-TOS Klingon ship)

And you know what? It's not going to bother me one bit. Sometimes a Starfleet ship is a Starfleet ship.

I think they care, just not in the way fans care.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I think they care, just not in the way fans care.

They care about story and character, but not the technicalities of Trek. For the reverse, see Enterprise seasons one and two, which were all about the technicalities and light on character or story.

 

[fireproof78]

They care about story and character, but not the technicalities of Trek. For the reverse, see Enterprise seasons one and two, which were all about the technicalities and light on character or story.

That's probably a better way to put it.

 

[Mage]

They care about story and character, but not the technicalities of Trek. For the reverse, see Enterprise seasons one and two, which were all about the technicalities and light on character or story.

Try explaining to Trekkies that it's about the characters and plot, not the ships and tech.

Please, people, notice the winking smilies......

 

[Mage]

Or then the Mirandas are much older than that. NCC-1864 doesn't come too much after NCC-1701, after all, and looks pretty much the same. And we saw NCC-1864 operating in "Court Martial" already - that is, we saw her registry.

Timo Saloniemi

The Vanguard series of novels already has a TOS-style Miranda class in operation, the Bombay. Some fan-art has shown her with a more simple hull design (like the TOS E) and TOS-style nacelles. I find that highly plausible, and with DSC set before TOS, Magee's still flying around during TNG isn't something I find out.

Besides, we saw a Prometheus class flying around in the same era as the E-J. Yup, I'm re-opening that can of worms.