Well, that incident touches on another concept: the difference between a line officer and a support officer. Line officers would be the ones with the training and knowledge to take command and make decisions related to tactics, shiphandling, etc. A support officer has specialized training in a non-operational or non-combat role and is limited to that mission. Starfleet does, apparently though, allow support/restricted-line/staff corps officers to qualify for command duty on a limited basis, as Beverly and Deanna both eventually did. In some ways, that really makes sense. It would be appropriate, for instance, for a medical ship to be captained by a command qualified medical corps officer, as we saw in "All Good Things..."
Ranks and Roles in TrekLit Starfleet
- Thread starter Shamrock Holmes
- Start date
Well, that incident touches on another concept: the difference between a line officer and a support officer. Line officers would be the ones with the training and knowledge to take command and make decisions related to tactics, shiphandling, etc. A support officer has specialized training in a non-operational or non-combat role and is limited to that mission. Starfleet does, apparently though, allow support/restricted-line/staff corps officers to qualify for command duty on a limited basis, as Beverly and Deanna both eventually did. In some ways, that really makes sense. It would be appropriate, for instance, for a medical ship to be captained by a command qualified medical corps officer, as we saw in "All Good Things..."
Does anyone else think it's odd that a ship like Riker's USS Titan has so many people of Commander's and Lt.commander's rank 
? Commanders: Vale (xo), Troi (diplomatic officer/counselor), Tuvok (second officer/tactical), Ra-Havreii (chief engineer), Dr. Ree(md) // Lt.Commanders: Keru(security), Pazlar(science), Jaza (science/RIP), Hachesa (left), Gibruch(gamma shift-replaced Hachesa) ), while Voyager has no commander's, only one Lt.commander as it's first officer and a full lieutenant as it's (de facto) second officer? 5 commanders , with 3 Lt.Commander's at the same time on Titan...
Is this due to the size of the ships? How much bigger is Titan than Voyager that there would be such a huge difference? Is it a crew size thing?
? Commanders: Vale (xo), Troi (diplomatic officer/counselor), Tuvok (second officer/tactical), Ra-Havreii (chief engineer), Dr. Ree(md) // Lt.Commanders: Keru(security), Pazlar(science), Jaza (science/RIP), Hachesa (left), Gibruch(gamma shift-replaced Hachesa) ), while Voyager has no commander's, only one Lt.commander as it's first officer and a full lieutenant as it's (de facto) second officer? 5 commanders , with 3 Lt.Commander's at the same time on Titan...Is this due to the size of the ships? How much bigger is Titan than Voyager that there would be such a huge difference? Is it a crew size thing?
Last edited:
Where did it say that they would be days away at SS velocity? I believe that they would still be months away, unless they are just going to the edge of the DQ. According to "Hope and Fear" the season 4 finale where they first discovered slipstream, they were still months away at best from the Federation. From what I gathered, the Project Full Circle Fleet is heading pretty far into the DQ on their search. The 8 other vessels are going to make it much easier, but since Voyager is the flag ship, you would think they would have more ranking officers on board. ...Just sayin'
According to a casualty list glimpsed in "Imperfection", Voyager prior to that episode lost at least one Commander and two Lieutenant Commanders in addition to Lieutenant Commander Cavit. It seems fair to assume that all these high-rank casualties were suffered when the Caretaker wave hit the ship. Supposedly one of those casualty list Lieutenant Commanders (either Ziegler or McCarry) was the Chief Medical Officer we saw but didn't hear named, while the other one might have been the Chief Engineer. If the novels give another name for the CMO, then that's four known LtCmdrs aboard that ship in "Caretaker"... The Commander (Bartlett) was probably the Chief Science Officer or somesuch, set aside from the direct chain of command and thus not at odds with the fact that the XO was a mere LtCmdr.
So the Starfleet way of crewing the Voyager need not be at odds with how the Titan is crewed, or how the Enterprise-A ended up being crewed eventually. The later Janeway/Maquis way would of course be different.
As for Gomez' yellow uniform vs. Admiral Toddman's, I'd argue that Admirals come in all colors. If we ever saw the top Medical or Sciences Admiral, he, she or it would be wearing blue. It's just that the plots never feature such flag officers, because the plot function of an Admiral is to give (hated) orders to the hero Captain, and only the "Command color" Admirals would have an excuse for doing so.
Toddman might have represented Starfleet Intelligence, a department whose colors are unknown to us. Usually SFI deals with hero skippers through intermediaries, typically redshirted Admirals. But Toddman might have been a rare direct contact with SFI.
Would Captains represent the full spectrum in a similar way? The novels don't exactly preclude hundreds of science vessel skippers from wearing blue. They only establish that there are no skippers who would represent the "yellow professions": Security, Engineering, possibly Intelligence, perhaps others. Which sort of makes sense: Security would not have its own starships, but would rather operate humble police cutters (if any) for purely Security-related jobs. And there would be few Engineering ships; most of the repair vessels or tenders out there wouldn't require a skipper who knows about engineering, and arguably the da Vinci doesn't/didn't, either (Gold always wore red, right?). As for specialized Intelligence vessels, I doubt the color of uniforms worn aboard those would be common knowledge.
Timo Saloniemi
However, "Timeless" showed Voyager covering nearly 10,000 light-years in what seemed to be only a minute or two. At that rate, anywhere in the galaxy could be reached in less time than it takes to cook spaghetti. There is no consistent information in canon about the speed of slipstream drive. The books have pretty much a blank slate and can choose whatever slipstream velocity makes for the best "speed of plot." If it were up to me, I'd probably go with a travel time of weeks. But that's just me.
I was actually talking about Voyager post series. The relaunch in particular after they've gotten home and have had ample time to restaff the ship. The latest book, Full Circle, covers a period from a few months after Voyager got home in 2378, to 2381, where Titan and TNG currently also reside.
Does anyone else think it's odd that a ship like Riker's USS Titan has so many people of Commander's and Lt.commander's rank
Is this due to the size of the ships? How much bigger is Titan than Voyager that there would be such a huge difference? Is it a crew size thing?
I think it mostly has to do with crew size (approx. 350 vice 140).
Honestly, I thought that in early TNG the ranks were artificially low for the size of the ship. Eventually, though, it worked out about right once Geordi and Worf made Lieutenant Commander. Some of the DS9 crew were also too junior in rank for the size of the Starfleet crew component in later seasons, IMHO.
One might argue that NCC-1701-D was something of a "schoolship" during the first season. That is, everything until "11001001" at least was considered a shakedown cruise, and the crew makeup reflected this - junior and senior officers were being groomed for duties on this vessel and on other Galaxy class ships. This would also explain the revolving-door Chief Engineers just fine.
As for the DS9 crew, one has to wonder... In "Captive Pursuit", O'Brien said there were about 300 people living on the station, apparently including all the merchants and camp followers. The actual sum total of Starfleet personnel and their families could still be evacuated with a few runabouts in "The Circle", save for the volunteers who remained behind to defend the station (and they don't count, since Sisko would have needed to convince his enemies that the runabouts had been sufficient for evacuating everybody anyway). So a single Commander plus a few Lieutenants sounds just dandy for the early seasons.
Does the situation really change in the later seasons? Starfleet arrives in considerable force all right. So does the Klingon military. But do those personnel fall under Sisko's command? Is there really a need to boost Sisko's own staff if a thousand men, women and BEMs under the direct command of Admiral Ross or General Martok happen to take residence under the same roof? Sisko could still be the humble station superintendent, keeping the central heating running and serving the coffee at the staff briefings of Ross and Martok.
Timo Saloniemi
As for the DS9 crew, one has to wonder... In "Captive Pursuit", O'Brien said there were about 300 people living on the station, apparently including all the merchants and camp followers. The actual sum total of Starfleet personnel and their families could still be evacuated with a few runabouts in "The Circle", save for the volunteers who remained behind to defend the station (and they don't count, since Sisko would have needed to convince his enemies that the runabouts had been sufficient for evacuating everybody anyway). So a single Commander plus a few Lieutenants sounds just dandy for the early seasons.
Does the situation really change in the later seasons? Starfleet arrives in considerable force all right. So does the Klingon military. But do those personnel fall under Sisko's command? Is there really a need to boost Sisko's own staff if a thousand men, women and BEMs under the direct command of Admiral Ross or General Martok happen to take residence under the same roof? Sisko could still be the humble station superintendent, keeping the central heating running and serving the coffee at the staff briefings of Ross and Martok.
Timo Saloniemi
Similar threads
