Are there 2 Klingon Homeworlds post-Undiscovered Country?

[Timofnine]

That would actually make things worse. If the mass blasts outward from the planet, then it will still have the same lateral orbital velocity. It'll still be in the same orbit, but with greater eccentricity, i.e. on a more elliptical path -- getting further out from the planet at apoapsis, but coming in closer to the planet at periapsis. So that would actually make the particles more likely to collide with the planet. (Imagine, say, pushing sideways on someone swinging on a swingset. It'll just make their swing more wobbly.)

The way to get something out of orbit entirely is to accelerate it forward. As it gains orbital velocity, it rises into a higher orbit, or leaves orbit entirely if it goes fast enough. But if you accelerate most of the moon's mass forward, then Newton's Third Law means that the big surviving chunk of Praxis will be decelerated and fall into a lower orbit. Which, again, could potentially make things far worse if it's decelerated enough for its orbit to decay.




It's highly implausible that a civilization at the Klingons' or Federation's level of advancement could artificially construct something massive enough to have a gravitational effect like that. Note how 80 years later in "Deja Q," the Enterprise struggled to move a much smaller asteroidal moon. (I suppose a Genesis device could potentially do it, given the magical abilities shown for it in TWOK, but Genesis was a political hot potato that was apparently outlawed, given how it was never referenced after TVH.)

Besides, the tide and weather patterns would eventually stabilize on their own once the mass of the moon debris settled into a ring around the planet. They'd be different from before, but they'd settle down over time. As with our current need to adapt to irreversible climate change, the goal would have to be to adjust to the new status quo, not try to recreate the old one.




It was the dilithium within the moon that exploded, so there's presumably none of it left. Although certainly the remains would be quite hot, so you could use it as a thermal energy source.




Picard season 1 seemed to indicate that they'd resettled on multiple worlds, and Discovery implied that they were essentially without a singular homeworld until they reconciled with the Vulcans and came together on Ni'Var (the planet formerly known as Vulcan).

But the blast that we see from Praxis is a two dimensional ‘disk’ which emanates outwards like the ripples in an ocean when a pebble is dropped in. these shockwaves moved only on a two dimensional plane, not a three dimensional one. The explosion only travelled along one axis, Surely if this burst of energy had hit a planet such as Qo’noS it would have caused even more apocalyptical destruction than we were told? The only explanation that I can think of is quite simply that the planet Qo’noS was just *slightly* below this two dimensional blast wave, therefore managing to avoid the brunt of the blast. The Klingon homeworld must have been hit by a ‘smaller’ blast.

I made a picture of how it happened in the film, but of course this is not to scale:

Speaking of scale, do we know how far exactly Praxis is from the Klingon homeworld? Praxis may not even be in a close orbit of the planet. Is it also possible that Praxis could have been a ‘Klingon moon’ orbiting another Klingon planet, or was it specified that it was a moon of the planet Qo’noS explicitly? A blast on the moon of a planet nearby to the Klingon homeworld of a scale as seen in Star Trek VI could still have resulted in damage to Qo’noS and it’s ecosystem, just like the blast damaged the Excelsior which was also *very* far away.

 

[Orphalesion]

I mean Star Trek often enough works by the laws of plot. So it stands to reason they found a solution for Praxis, even if that solution doesn't necessarily make sense with our laws of physics.
In that one Lower decks episode they also managed to destroy a moon without it influencing the planet negatively.
Granted it was just "a" moon of several that planet had and it was in the late 24th century, but I'm sure they were able to manage to destroy Praxis without destroying Kronos.
Of course how the destruction of a moon influenced the climate and seasons of Kronos after that is anybody's guess.

 

[Timofnine]

Look at this:

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The energy from the Praxis explosion was *definitely* projected outwards in a disk like ring. The Klingon home world was almost certainly relatively safe from the blast being located either *slightly* above or *slightly* below this blast radius ‘ring’. Now, Captain Sulu was admittedly caught off guard but he could have quite easily flown the Excelsior below or above the shockwave too given more time and warning.

 

[Christopher]

But the blast that we see from Praxis is a two dimensional ‘disk’ which emanates outwards like the ripples in an ocean when a pebble is dropped in.

That is obvious nonsense that should not be taken literally. Few Trek visual effects should be taken literally. Like when the TOS Enterprise orbits a planet following a visibly curving course -- that would only work if the planet were really, really tiny. Or when two ships are naked-eye visible in the same shot when dialogue says they're tens of thousands of kilometers apart. Visual effects are figurative and symbolic, designed for narrative effect and clarity. They are not scientifically accurate observational data.

Any blast wave in space would propagate as a sphere, and the fact that it was a Star Trek movie that started the idiotic VFX fad of flat expanding rings from space explosions is a source of great embarrassment to me as a Trek fan.

these shockwaves moved only on a two dimensional plane, not a three dimensional one. The explosion only travelled along one axis,

A plane has two axes. If it traveled in one axis, it would be a line.

Is it also possible that Praxis could have been a ‘Klingon moon’ orbiting another Klingon planet, or was it specified that it was a moon of the planet Qo’noS explicitly?

The moon's explosion was specifically said to cause devastation to Kronos itself and require its evacuation. That would make no sense if it were around a completely different planet. Of course, the script also made no sense in treating the destruction of the Klingon homeworld as equivalent to the destruction of the entire Klingon Empire, but one can handwave that by assuming a highly centralized political system.

A blast on the moon of a planet nearby to the Klingon homeworld of a scale as seen in Star Trek VI could still have resulted in damage to Qo’noS and it’s ecosystem, just like the blast damaged the Excelsior which was also *very* far away.

So a nonsensically flat blast wave in 3-dimensional space (which also somehow travels faster than light) is coincidentally aimed so perfectly that it manages to strike both the Klingon homeworld and a distant Federation starship, by pure luck? That's ludicrously improbable, like assuming that I could drop a basketball at random off the top of a skyscraper, have it land right in the hoop of a rooftop basketball court far below, then have it bounce off and fall right through the hoop of another basketball court at ground level. It makes no sense to favor an insanely improbable interpretation of the evidence over the simple, straightforward interpretation.

 

[Timofnine]

That is obvious nonsense that should not be taken literally. Few Trek visual effects should be taken literally. Like when the TOS Enterprise orbits a planet following a visibly curving course -- that would only work if the planet were really, really tiny. Or when two ships are naked-eye visible in the same shot when dialogue says they're tens of thousands of kilometers apart. Visual effects are figurative and symbolic, designed for narrative effect and clarity. They are not scientifically accurate observational data.

Any blast wave in space would propagate as a sphere, and the fact that it was a Star Trek movie that started the idiotic VFX fad of flat expanding rings from space explosions is a source of great embarrassment to me as a Trek fan.

I disagree, @Christopher . Let me explain. If there was a Nuclear style explosion in space, for example on a planetoid or moon, then the blast radius of the heated matter and energy would indeed be spherical. However, there would also be cooler matter which would need to go somewhere. The blast wave of ejected heated matter and energy would cause a cavity to form which would contain lighter gases and matter… these would then likely compress/suck energy back inwards like an ‘hour glass neck’ and eventually rupture outwards in to an explosive ring like shape across the diameter of the blast, being projected outwards at a high velocity in a seemingly two dimensional shockwave *seperate* from the smaller spherical blast radius. I hope that makes sense, it is really hard to explain. I can draw a picture though if you would like. I think that the depiction in Star Trek VI explains it perfectly though; first we see the smaller spherical blast wave then we see the ring like shockwave which projects from the centre of the blast across the spherical blasts diameter.

A plane has two axes. If it traveled in one axis, it would be a line.

I am glad that you paid attention to the last time that I pointed out to you that space has x, y, -x and -y axis and varying angles of 360 degrees. Now you just need to apply this principle to spaceflight in regards to Voyager’s journey home.

The moon's explosion was specifically said to cause devastation to Kronos itself and require its evacuation. That would make no sense if it were around a completely different planet. Of course, the script also made no sense in treating the destruction of the Klingon home world as equivalent to the destruction of the entire Klingon Empire, but one can handwave that by assuming a highly centralized political system.

The Klingon Home world itself could have been stripped of it’s resources by themselves or even by the Ferengi when they made first contact with the pre warp Klingons, a bit like how the Cardassians exploited Bajor’s resources. The Klingons obviously revolted against the Ferengi and stole all of their tech.

So a nonsensically flat blast wave in 3-dimensional space (which also somehow travels faster than light) is coincidentally aimed so perfectly that it manages to strike both the Klingon homeworld and a distant Federation starship, by pure luck? That's ludicrously improbable, like assuming that I could drop a basketball at random off the top of a skyscraper, have it land right in the hoop of a rooftop basketball court far below, then have it bounce off and fall right through the hoop of another basketball court at ground level. It makes no sense to favor an insanely improbable interpretation of the evidence over the simple, straightforward interpretation.

When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. This is what Spock said in Star Trek VI, too.

 

[XCV330]

I disagree, @Christopher . Let me explain. If there was a Nuclear style explosion in space,

There are. Supernovae and the results have been observed. See crab nebula for reference. It's not hypotherical and the results (of explosions in space) are literally everywhere.

However, there would also be cooler matter which would need to go somewhere. The blast wave of ejected heated matter and energy would cause a cavity to form which would contain lighter gases and matter… these would then likely compress/suck energy back inwards like an ‘hour glass neck’ and eventually rupture outwards in to an explosive ring like shape across the diameter of the blast

No. debris ring form slowly over time and may occupy the solar equatorial plane but that is a process that might take hundreds of millions of years and is not a given. Plenty of ejecta and comets orbit on much higher inclinations. Ring nebulae, again form over much longer periods of time. There's no vacuum to be sucked back into. The ejecta of an explosion at that kind of velocity are not going to be overcoming discernable drag, and this negative pressure zone is less than or equal to the surrounding spatial vacuum. Nature abhors a hoover but she's surrounded. I can't believe I replied to this.

I'm not a fan of most of the book but if anyone wants to read a well thought out narrative of what an exploding moon might be like, the affects it would have on an inhabited world, and whether it could be survived, read Neal Stephenson's seveneves. It was going to be made into a movie series but I don't know if that's going to happen, now. Sometimes someone else already did the homework.

 

[Timofnine]

There are. Supernovae and the results have been observed. See crab nebula for reference. It's not hypotherical and the results (of explosions in space) are literally everywhere.




No. debris ring form slowly over time and may occupy the solar equatorial plane but that is a process that might take hundreds of millions of years and is not a given. Plenty of ejecta and comets orbit on much higher inclinations. Ring nebulae, again form over much longer periods of time. There's no vacuum to be sucked back into. The ejecta of an explosion at that kind of velocity are not going to be overcoming discernable drag, and this negative pressure zone is less than or equal to the surrounding spatial vacuum. Nature abhors a hoover but she's surrounded. I can't believe I replied to this.

I'm not a fan of most of the book but if anyone wants to read a well thought out narrative of what an exploding moon might be like, the affects it would have on an inhabited world, and whether it could be survived, read Neal Stephenson's seveneves. It was going to be made into a movie series but I don't know if that's going to happen, now. Sometimes someone else already did the homework.

I’m busy at the moment, I’ll draw you a picture later.

 

[XCV330]

I’m busy at the moment, I’ll draw you a picture later.

oh, thanks. you shouldn't have.


(edit so as not to make a second reply)
I will just add a bit further, any large spherical body is going to exhibit spin. It may not look like it due to being in tidal lock with the larger body it orbits, but that's more a matter of perspective. there's still spin, so the ejecta will take on some characteristics of that spin, and this will not be entirely uniform (in the same way most equitorial-orbit launch sites are as close as possible, politics permitting, to the equator to take advantage of that extra momentum. but again that kind of three dimensional spiral pattern is not going to be all that apparent for awhile.

 

[Timofnine]

oh, thanks. you shouldn't have.


(edit so as not to make a second reply)
I will just add a bit further, any large spherical body is going to exhibit spin. It may not look like it due to being in tidal lock with the larger body it orbits, but that's more a matter of perspective. there's still spin, so the ejecta will take on some characteristics of that spin, and this will not be entirely uniform (in the same way most equitorial-orbit launch sites are as close as possible, politics permitting, to the equator to take advantage of that extra momentum. but again that kind of three dimensional spiral pattern is not going to be all that apparent for awhile.

Yeah, that will probably make the disk eventually develop spiral like characteristics similar to our galaxy if the explosion was big enough.

I forgot about a few more final stages where the hour glass expands in to a sphere again with the two hemispheres merging in to a globe of energy and matter, though there would still be the shockwave blast disk expanding out from it, probably in a spiral because of the conservation of momentum.

This would make it look like this:

And then this:

 

[Timofnine]

I put the other stages in:

In theory, the very final stage (not shown) would just be a ring of matter and energy, becoming like a ring galaxy? The second to the last stage is when the hour glass bubbles collapse in to one mass of energy and matter due to gravity, the final picture is our galaxy as it is now in it’s familiar form. Technically, the mass of the galaxy would still be a sphere shape. The rest of a galactic sphere’s mass would be made up of ‘dark forms of matter’ which can not be seen.

So, who’s going to mathematically model this for me? I’m no good at maths.

 

[Tuskin38]

hey didn't entirely lose Praxis; a fair chunk of it remained

Just for future reference, don't link directly to Wiki images, it doesn't work it will just show as a broken image for over people. Upload them somewhere else, or find an alt source.

It will work fine for you and other people who have already looked at the image recently (probably a cache thing), but for other people the image won't show.

 

[Tuskin38]

or even by the Ferengi when they made first contact with the pre warp Klingons

What? That's not from any canon source.

 

[Timofnine]

What? That's not from any canon source.

I definitely read it in a Star Trek novel when I was younger, but in DS9 they changed the narrative and renamed this species as the Hur’q and said that they were a species from the Gamma Quadrant? The Hur’q/Ferengi are the race that stole the sword of Kahless. Hur’q means ‘outsider’ in Klingon and is not the name of a particular race. So you are correct, the Ferengi were never named in *canon* as the species which made first contact with the Klingon’s and pillaged their homeworld, however in one of the novels it was *definitely* the Ferengi. I have a good memory and distinctively remember reading it because it was around the same time as watching The Last Outpost and my favourite TNG Ferengi episode, The Battle. The Ferengi were supposed to be the big bad at the time and as a child I actually thought they were cool and scary. I know that they are silly now though.

In the novel (I will try to recall which one!), way before DS9 changed the story and adapted it in to canon with the Hur’q, the Ferengi made first contact and exploited the Klingon’s and their planet, but eventually the Klingon people rose up and revolted, stealing all of their tech including warp drives and driving the Ferengi off world. This is how the Klingons became a warp capable race, but I guess that it is not canon now because Deep Space Nine said otherwise.

 

[Christopher]

In the novel (I will try to recall which one!), way before DS9 changed the story and adapted it in to canon with the Hur’q, the Ferengi made first contact and exploited the Klingon’s and their planet, but eventually the Klingon people rose up and revolted, stealing all of their tech including warp drives and driving the Ferengi off world. This is how the Klingons became a warp capable race, but I guess that it is not canon now because Deep Space Nine said otherwise.

Trek novels have never been canonical, and it's a mistake to assume their conjectures have any kind of canonical weight -- and I say that as someone who writes them for a living. If canon is "history," tie-in novels and comics are essentially "historical fiction," speculative stories about things that theoretically could have happened in the universe defined by screen canon, but nothing more than conjectures. When screen canon goes in a different direction, it's not "changing" the story, since the tie-in version was never the official story to begin with.

I don't recall any novel claiming that the Ferengi made first contact with the Klingons. But what you're describing is an almost exact match for the Klingon backstory from the 1985 novel Ishmael by Barbara Hambly, except it wasn't the Ferengi (who hadn't been created yet), but a species original to the novel, the Karsids. The Karsids presented themselves as traders and took over gradually to make their subjects dependent on them. So you're probably confusing them with the Ferengi.

(At least, I think the Karsids were original to the novel. Hambly peppered Ishmael with a ton of references to other TV and prose fiction, and indeed the entire novel was an unauthorized crossover with the TV series Here Come the Brides.)

 

[Timofnine]

Trek novels have never been canonical, and it's a mistake to assume their conjectures have any kind of canonical weight -- and I say that as someone who writes them for a living. If canon is "history," tie-in novels and comics are essentially "historical fiction," speculative stories about things that theoretically could have happened in the universe defined by screen canon, but nothing more than conjectures. When screen canon goes in a different direction, it's not "changing" the story, since the tie-in version was never the official story to begin with.

I don't recall any novel claiming that the Ferengi made first contact with the Klingons. But what you're describing is an almost exact match for the Klingon backstory from the 1985 novel Ishmael by Barbara Hambly, except it wasn't the Ferengi (who hadn't been created yet), but a species original to the novel, the Karsids. The Karsids presented themselves as traders and took over gradually to make their subjects dependent on them. So you're probably confusing them with the Ferengi.

(At least, I think the Karsids were original to the novel. Hambly peppered Ishmael with a ton of references to other TV and prose fiction, and indeed the entire novel was an unauthorized crossover with the TV series Here Come the Brides.)

This makes sense if I did read this book at the same time as watching the early TNG Ferengi episodes, my mind could have connected the two species because I was interested in the Ferengi at the time and they seem *kind* of similar… until TNG/DS9 turned them in to a comedy race. I seem to recall that it was written in an early TNG novel though, not a TOS novel and that it was also not a main plot point to the story as in this novel with the Karsids - it was a few paragraphs of background information unrelated to the story. There was *definitely* mention of warp drive being stolen off the invaders though, as one of the points of what I read was that the Klingon’s did not invent warp drive themselves; they obtained it from their occupiers during a revolt. If it mentions this point in the book Ishmael then it was definitely the book that I read it in as that is a *very* precise story point which stood out to me. The Ishmael book cover is familiar to me and I read all of the 1990’s Next Gen novels and most of TOS, but I would have been put off by the cover of this book as a child as it did not have spaceships or aliens on it. The front covers were very important to me.

 

[Christopher]

I seem to recall that it was written in an early TNG novel though, not a TOS novel and that it was also not a main plot point to the story as in this novel with the Karsids - it was a few paragraphs of background information unrelated to the story. There was *definitely* mention of warp drive being stolen off the invaders though, as one of the points of what I read was that the Klingon’s did not invent warp drive themselves; they obtained it from their occupiers during a revolt. If it mentions this point in the book Ishmael then it was definitely the book that I read it in as that is a *very* precise story point which stood out to me.

That is indeed from Ishmael, as the Memory Beta link would have told you. I can't rule out the possibility of an early TNG novel mentioning the Ferengi having contacted the Klingons in the past, but if it were from that era, I think I'd probably remember such a reference, since I read those novels repeatedly. At most, I'd say you're conflating a passing reference from a TNG novel with the Karsid material from Ishmael.

 

[Timofnine]

That is indeed from Ishmael, as the Memory Beta link would have told you. I can't rule out the possibility of an early TNG novel mentioning the Ferengi having contacted the Klingons in the past, but if it were from that era, I think I'd probably remember such a reference, since I read those novels repeatedly. At most, I'd say you're conflating a passing reference from a TNG novel with the Karsid material from Ishmael.

Then I can only conclude that I have indeed read Ishmael, but with me being so young at the time all of the other pop culture references such as ‘Here Comes the Bride’ would have totally gone over my head. I still do not know what ‘Here Comes the Bride’ is even now. Perhaps Gene Roddenberry took inspiration from the Karsids for the Ferengi from this book? Surely he must have read this novel first as it does pre-date TNG? The Ferengi were supposed to be the ‘new’ Klingon’s when TNG launched, so what better way to promote them as a threat than have them be the species that subjugated the Klingons. I think that it is too much of a coincidence.

 

[Christopher]

I still do not know what ‘Here Comes the Bride’ is even now.

Here Come the Brides was a Western set in Seattle, based on the real-life practice where women from the East were shipped out to Western frontier towns to help bring civilization and provide eligible potential mates for the male settlers -- the same practice that inspired "Mudd's Women." The show starred several Star Trek guests, notably Mark Lenard as the main villain and Robert Brown and David Soul as two of the hero brothers, so it was popular with Trek fans. Ishmael started as a fanfic where Spock was thrown back in time without his memory and Lenard's character took him in as a sort of surrogate son, in homage to his role as Sarek.

Perhaps Gene Roddenberry took inspiration from the Karsids for the Ferengi from this book? Surely he must have read this novel first as it does pre-date TNG?

Very unlikely. At the time it was written and published, he wasn't actively producing any Trek production, so he wouldn't have had any professional reason to vet the novels, and TV creators rarely read their shows' tie-in novels for recreation (since they prefer their recreational reading to be an escape from their work). Plus, in the 1980s, he became jealously protective of his creation and was not fond of other people's interpretations of it. So he wouldn't have borrowed ideas from the books even if he had read them.

Roddenberry created the Ferengi as a satire of 20th-century American capitalism, and he modeled them on "Yankee traders" from history -- and, unfortunately, probably on unflattering stereotypes of short, greedy, untrustworthy Jewish businessmen, since he came from a generation where ethnic stereotypes were common currency in fiction and not usually recognized as offensive (not by the white majority, at least). The Usurians in Doctor Who: "The Sunmakers" and the goblins in Harry Potter are based on the same stereotypes.

 

[Timofnine]

So, Christopher, it is entirely possible that the Hur’q, which is not this species actual name but the Klingon designation for them, are indeed one and the same with the Karsid? It is possible that the DS9 writers copied or were somewhat inspired by this storyline from the book Ishmael and used the Karsid/Hur’q subjugation of the pre warp Klingon homeworld as a basis for the background of the episode The Sword of Kahless.

Because the historical background is so similar to that of this book, they probably had to change the name of the species from the Karsid’s to the Hur’q for legal reasons. If the producers had directly referenced or copied story points from Star Trek books then they would probably need to pay the writers royalties for the use of their ideas or characters. I’m not sure how it all works to be honest, but I know that people need to be credited for their work and ideas… this is why creative sorts are often in unions.

 

[Dryson]

See, this is why I hate conspiracy theories. It's ridiculous to imagine a "cover-up" when it's far simpler and more straighforward just to assume that the scientists in 2293 were wrong about the necessity of evacuating Qo'noS.

Why would Starfleet covering up the location of the Klingon homeworld by simply referring to the homeworld as the Klingon Homeworld during TNG be a conspiracy?

In DS9, the Dominion eventually launched an assault on the Federation that the Klingons played a pivotal role in.

The destruction of Praxis could also have been detected by Dominion scouts who had come through the Bajoran wormhole long before the Dominion fleet did and had been gathering intel on the species of the new territory using Shape Shifters.

One could suggest that the reason why the Dominion invaded Federation territory was because the Klingons were able to keep the actual location of their new homeworld, secret or covered up, with the assistance of Starfleet, to keep other hostile forces from concentrating a focused fleet to wipe the Klingons out while the Klingon Empire recovered from the destruction of Praxis.

The cover up of the Klingon homeworld would have made the Klingon empire appear fractured and disorganized that also made the Federation appear not as strong and easy pickings.