Separate Crews for DS9 & The Defiant

[Nathan]

One thing that always bothered me that the same guys who ran DS9 operations also ran the Defiant. Yeah, for the TV show, guess the veiwer wanted to see Dax while on DS9 and when they go on the ship rather have Dax get script lines so she is also the ship's pilot rather than someone more qualified/intimately familiar with the ship operations. Guess the closest was with Worf...wasn't it mentioned that he sleeps on the Defiant and really commands the ship.

Another thing I like about Vanguard is that Reyes never said, "Hmmm....gotta go see what is going on the planet.....everyone in the Vanguard bridge, meet me on the bridge of the Endeavor, we're moving out!!!!!"

I guess now in the books, I don't know why they can't have separate crews. I wonder how many skills set cross over from station operations to ship operations.

Guess it still annoys me that Harry Kim is the Security Chief now Operations....and I think, "When the hell did he ever express interest, let alone get training in it?" And not only he got ship security training but leads landing parties firefights.

Hell, even in the Navy, the Navy officer that runs ship security does not have the same skill set as a naval officer that "takes the beachhead" And if there is someone who does possess both skill sets, didnt just transfer into that position after serving numerous years in another area of expertise.

Yes, yes, it probably is a plot device, but I just wonder if anyone saw the same thing. I guess the argument that Checkov went from Navigation to Security, but when he was navigator he wasn't the Chief Navigator (unless an Ensign holds that spot). Even Sulu, wasn't he in Botany sciences for a while before he became the Helmsman. I don't think Sulu was the chief botanist on the ship.

Anyway, I guess I don't characters moving positions for plot devices only.

 

[captcalhoun]

the stupidity regarding DS9 and the Defiant is in Tears of the Prophets when they left Dax on the station and took Kira to Chin'toka. WTF?!

It would've been a lot better to simply write Jadzia out by having her on the ship and the ship get damaged and her killed. much more realistic.

the reused crews is probably to save costs by having a smaller cast.

 

[Sho]

Technically, the show had Worf being in command of the Defiant, iirc. But yeah, they never took that very far.

 

[Deranged Nasat]

Indeed, Kira on the Defiant at all was often rather difficult to swallow, given that her position in the hierarchy of DS9 shouldn't extend to the ship, unless I'm missing something. DS9 is a Bajoran station, jointly administered by Starfleet, but Defiant is Starfleet property. If Bajor wanted to boot the Federation off DS9, they could, but they'd have zero claim to the Defiant. So surely if Kira's aboard it would be entirely in her role as Bajoran liaison, not as part of its command structure? Having her as a crewman seems degrading and having her in the centre seat feels like it should be causing intense legal headaches. She should be there to observe if she's there at all. I know no-one in the audience wants to leave such a good character behind when they go off on their missions, but it was confusing sometimes. Particularly when at other times the Defiant command structure seemed to be a more plausible Sisko-Worf-Dax...

And we didn't see other Bajoran Militia personnel aboard, unless I'm mistaken.

I know Worf was on several Klingon ships, but given his membership in the House of Martok, I assume he had legal basis to be on a ship under Martok's ultimate command. From the Klingon viewpoint, he was one of them, I guess?

 

[Christopher]

Guess it still annoys me that Harry Kim is the Security Chief now Operations....and I think, "When the hell did he ever express interest, let alone get training in it?" And not only he got ship security training but leads landing parties firefights.

Hell, even in the Navy, the Navy officer that runs ship security does not have the same skill set as a naval officer that "takes the beachhead" And if there is someone who does possess both skill sets, didnt just transfer into that position after serving numerous years in another area of expertise.

Yes, yes, it probably is a plot device, but I just wonder if anyone saw the same thing. I guess the argument that Checkov went from Navigation to Security, but when he was navigator he wasn't the Chief Navigator (unless an Ensign holds that spot). Even Sulu, wasn't he in Botany sciences for a while before he became the Helmsman. I don't think Sulu was the chief botanist on the ship.

No, Sulu was the astrophysicist in the second pilot, then moved to the helm. Botany was one of his many hobbies.

There's a lot of cross-training in Starfleet, and it seems particularly common for people to move into security from other jobs -- Chekov from navigation (after a stint in science and, according to the novel continuity, a previous stint in engineering), Worf from bridge watch officer, even Nog briefly serving as DS9's security chief before Ro took over the job (though that wasn't technically a Starfleet post at the time).

But we've seen other transfers too -- aside from Sulu and Chekov, Geordi moved from helm to engineering, Worf from security to strategic operations, O'Brien from tactical to engineering (with a stint at conn in the TNG pilot), Ezri from counseling to command-track (in the novels), etc. Plus all the background players in TOS who moved from job to job as the script demanded, like Leslie and De Salle and Martine.

I figure the rationale is that Starfleet training is broad enough that everyone's given a grounding in a variety of disciplines, on the principle that if you're on a ship way out in the unknown and you lose some of your crew, you need others who are qualified to take their place (as we saw in Voyager, with Tom initially doubling up on nursing duty, Harry essentially doing the science officer's job for seven years, etc.).


I do agree, though, that they should've had distinct characters as the DS9 ops crew and the Defiant crew. It's not as if DS9 had any reluctance to populate the station with a large group of supporting characters, so why not add a dedicated Defiant crew?

 

[Sho]

^ They did that a teensy-tiny bit with Fabian Stevens, who iirc pops up exclusively in Defiant engineering.

 

[Christopher]

^ They did that a teensy-tiny bit with Fabian Stevens, who iirc pops up exclusively in Defiant engineering.

Well, in the sense that he was a guest star in exactly one episode, "Starship Down" (by David Mack & John J. Ordover). A better example would be Enrique Muniz, who was introduced in the same episode but was seen twice more after that.

 

[Sho]

Ah hm ... I thought Stevens had appeared at least twice, too.

 

[Relayer1]

I don't find it hard to believe that in a semi-military organisation facing hazardous situations, everyone in Starfleet must have SOME security training. Some piloting and navigation too I would think.

 

[C.E. Evans]

IMO, the Defiant was assigned to DS9 and is part of its inventory of vehicles not too unlike the runabouts. I think most of the time the ship is docked at the station between missions.

 

[JD]

One thing that always bothered me that the same guys who ran DS9 operations also ran the Defiant. Yeah, for the TV show, guess the veiwer wanted to see Dax while on DS9 and when they go on the ship rather have Dax get script lines so she is also the ship's pilot rather than someone more qualified/intimately familiar with the ship operations. Guess the closest was with Worf...wasn't it mentioned that he sleeps on the Defiant and really commands the ship.

In the DS9-R we have Prynn, who - as far as I know - was just Defiant's pilot. And I had always assumed that the Defiant was set up specifically for the DS9 crew.

I guess now in the books, I don't know why they can't have separate crews. I wonder how many skills set cross over from station operations to ship operations.

Guess it still annoys me that Harry Kim is the Security Chief now Operations....and I think, "When the hell did he ever express interest, let alone get training in it?" And not only he got ship security training but leads landing parties firefights.

Yeah, I was kinds surprised by that too, but then I thought that maybe the ops officer got at least some training for all of the positions that fall under the Operations banner. Didn't we see Data and Kim working in Engineering in both series. And I think it's also worth mentioning that apparently everbody knows at least a little bit about flying the ship, since it seems like at one time or another we saw people from almost every bridge position. Didn't Beverly even sit at the helm for a few minutes in "Remember Me"?

Indeed, Kira on the Defiant at all was often rather difficult to swallow, given that her position in the hierarchy of DS9 shouldn't extend to the ship, unless I'm missing something. DS9 is a Bajoran station, jointly administered by Starfleet, but Defiant is Starfleet property. If Bajor wanted to boot the Federation off DS9, they could, but they'd have zero claim to the Defiant. So surely if Kira's aboard it would be entirely in her role as Bajoran liaison, not as part of its command structure? Having her as a crewman seems degrading and having her in the centre seat feels like it should be causing intense legal headaches. She should be there to observe if she's there at all. I know no-one in the audience wants to leave such a good character behind when they go off on their missions, but it was confusing sometimes. Particularly when at other times the Defiant command structure seemed to be a more plausible Sisko-Worf-Dax...

And we didn't see other Bajoran Militia personnel aboard, unless I'm mistaken.

Yeah, the Kira on the Defiant thing has always kinda bothered me too.

 

[Christopher]

Didn't Beverly even sit at the helm for a few minutes in "Remember Me"?

I don't remember that specifically, but Uhura took over navigation in "Balance of Terror."

 

[JD]

Just checked the screen caps from TrekCore and it was Ops and Tactical, not the helm.

 

[Dark Gilligan]

I don't find it hard to believe that in a semi-military organisation facing hazardous situations, everyone in Starfleet must have SOME security training. Some piloting and navigation too I would think.

Agreed. Even McCoy was shown to have trained on the bridge simulator while at the Academy.

 

[Brikar99]

My impression of Starfleet Academy always seemed to be sort of like a four-year liberal arts college. There's required general courses everyone has to take, and then you get the specialized coursework depending on what field you want to go in... and dorms and lectures... in space.

 

[BrotherBenny]

Kira may have been a liaison officer (for the purposes of the Circle trilogy at least) but she was also the first officer as explicitly stated in Emissary (I wanted a Bajoran national as my first officer), so she had specific standing in the command hierarchy. That would mean that she could command the Defiant. Starfleet Command probably gave Sisko a huge amount of leeway because it was their intention to have Bajor join the Federation, and allowing Kira to command the Defiant showed their trust in her.

It wasn't the same situation as in Enterprise where Subcommander T'Pol essentially commandeered the ship after Archer was injured claiming that her rank superseded Tucker's who was a Commander in the Starfleet hierarchy.

 

[Skywalker]

Kira may have been a liaison officer (for the purposes of the Circle trilogy at least) but she was also the first officer as explicitly stated in Emissary (I wanted a Bajoran national as my first officer), so she had specific standing in the command hierarchy. That would mean that she could command the Defiant. Starfleet Command probably gave Sisko a huge amount of leeway because it was their intention to have Bajor join the Federation, and allowing Kira to command the Defiant showed their trust in her.

Kira was first officer only on Deep Space Nine, not the Defiant. Her standing in the command hierarchy existed only on the station itself. Worf was explicitly stated to be in command of the Defiant (when Sisko wasn't commanding it, of course). Kira commanding the Defiant is just a silly Hollywood contrivance, nothing more. There's no need to go out of our way to rationalize it.

Basically, Worf and Kira should have been on equal footing. When they're on DS9 and Sisko's not around, Worf should answer to Kira. When they're on the Defiant and Sisko's not around, Kira should answer to Worf.

 

[Julio Angel Ortiz]

Funny, the only time I thought any like this was odd was during an early 6th season episode (when DS9 had been captured by the Dominion and Sisko was the adjutant to Admiral Ross (?)) when Jadzia returned on a mission and she had been commanding the Defiant, if my memory serves me correctly.

 

[Brikar99]

Funny, the only time I thought any like this was odd was during an early 6th season episode (when DS9 had been captured by the Dominion and Sisko was the adjutant to Admiral Ross (?)) when Jadzia returned on a mission and she had been commanding the Defiant, if my memory serves me correctly.

At the time, Kira was back on the station under Dominion rule and Worf was going on missions aboard Martok's ship with the Klingons. Seems to me that left Dax as the next senior officer to take charge - and at her age, it's not like she lacks experience.

 

[JD]

^What he said. It makes perfect sense to me... or at least a lot more sense than Kira in command.