Hopefully we will find out but I wonder if Riker and Troi are still in Starfleet? Maybe they are on break while the Titan is in Spacedock for refitting, or do you think they are retired?
Spoiler Jonathan Frakes has stated in an interview that Riker is not in Starfleet any longer. Presumably Deanna isn't either.
I expect they are raising their kid or kids. Although I expect it is a little rough going, as Will tries to teach the 'Ultimate Martial Art' like his dad taught him and Deanna is constantly asking the kid or kids to talk about their feelings with lots of "I'm sensing...".
I suppose the question is why they quit - was it for the same reasons as Picard (or in direct support of him), was it because they didn't want to raise kids on a starship in battles, or did they just want out after time served?
They could well have resigned in solidarity with Picard when he left Starfleet after the rescue armada was terminated. By that point they would have been on the Titan for six or seven years and might have been comfortable leaving, having put in their time on the ship.
Spoiler Riker was thrown out of the service when he allowed Troi to take the helm as Titan left space-dock and she crashed into the moon.
I'm going to assume like Picard they've taken a dislike to the direction Starfleet/the Federation seems to be taking.
I’m hoping it is simply: we wanted to do something different after 30 or so years in service. It would be refreshing for them to have simply moved on in life. It isn’t something we see much of in Trek.
Kirk retired after coming home from his second five-year mission circa 2278 and was only in his mid-to-late forties at that point so early retirements and just being done with the life happen in Trek. But it's rare. And with Kirk he ended up returning to Starfleet in 2284 after he and Antonia split up so even that retirement didn't take.
Seems Riker did everything he wanted to do with his career so I wouldn’t be surprised if they simply retired to raise a family.
I always get confused by the timings of this... Did Kirk retire after The Undiscovered Country, and re-join prior to Generations, or was the gap somewhere else?
Well, he never did get command of the Enterprise (as far as we know) and I think that was on his bucket list. They should have a scene where the daughter walks in and.....she's half Klingon!
Most would be nearing, if not over, forty years of service. I don't see an issue with them going on with their lives.
/\It would mean that Starfleet would only be staffed by 1:Bastards and 2:Romulan spies.(The Romulans probably outnumbering the rest). It would be interesting to know which rank Riker held at retirement....throw a little sop to the lit verse and make him an admiral.
I think the "problem" here is the TOS movies keeping the same characters in largely the same places they were in the TV show right up until ST6. It was always silly, but it set expectations with some people. (Even on the TNG side, after the S2 reshuffle, most of the characters stayed in the same positions all the way up until Nemesis - even Worf kept finding excuses to end up back on the Enterprise, having moved to DS9/the Defiant and supposedly left Starfleet in the final episode thereof.)