Did they make the Jem'Hadar too strong?

[ReadyAndWilling]

Anyone else think they were made a bit too strong?

They don't sleep, eat and only need white to live. They have no sense of morality, other than what it takes to achieve victory. They can even cloak!

I mean, the only thing they were missing were probably inbuilt rocket lasers.

 

[Leathco]

If you are gonna create a species or alter one genetically, plus program it to defend you, wouldn't you want it to be as close to invincible as possible?

 

[indolover]

The way I see it is so:

- The Founders wish to control solids
- To do this, they created the ultimate killing machine/soldier
- Using their ultimate killing machines they can intimidate the solids and maintain the Dominion

 

[Gul Re'jal]

Don't forget their scary, reptilian looks with all those horns and pebbles protruding from their faces.

They were engineered, so the Founders could overdo them, but that's what they wanted. After all the Dominion wanted to "introduce" their order to chaotic solids, so they needed someone to do the dirty job effectively.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I mean, the only thing they were missing were probably inbuilt rocket lasers.

Attached to their fricken' heads.

 

[Navaros]

Interesting question.

It could be said that they did make them too strong in terms of how in later episodes the Jemmies become easily-defeated, generic cattle who don't cloak; don't invade the station at will (like they do in their debut), don't display the intelligence like they do in their first appearances, etc. etc.

I don't think it is really a problem of them making Jemmies too strong though. Rather, it is a problem of them copping-out with lazy, weak writing in the later Jemmy appearances. I'm sure they could have made later Jemmy writing on par with early Jemmy writing if they had bothered to put in the effort to do so.

 

[Smellincoffee]

The Jem'Hedar were intimidating: I liked them as an enemy. They could've had the Alpha Quadrant -- and the Beta, since the Klingons and Romulans are around there -- with just a FRACTION of their forces.

 

[StarryEyed]

One thing for sure, NO human should have been able to match one in a fight. If these things were genetically engineered specifically to be fighters, no biological in Star Trek outside a Hirogen or Species 8472 should have been a match for them.

 

[Praxius]

Anyone else think they were made a bit too strong?

They don't sleep, eat and only need white to live. They have no sense of morality, other than what it takes to achieve victory. They can even cloak!

I mean, the only thing they were missing were probably inbuilt rocket lasers.

I wouldn't say they were too strong.... I seen plenty get their arse kicked and Sisko beat the crap out of a number of them when they boarded the Defiant until they cut to another scene if I remember correctly..... seems like they weren't strong enough if one lowly Hu'Mon could take them out with his bare hands lol.

 

[StarryEyed]

Anyone else think they were made a bit too strong?

They don't sleep, eat and only need white to live. They have no sense of morality, other than what it takes to achieve victory. They can even cloak!

I mean, the only thing they were missing were probably inbuilt rocket lasers.

I wouldn't say they were too strong.... I seen plenty get their arse kicked and Sisko beat the crap out of a number of them when they boarded the Defiant until they cut to another scene if I remember correctly..... seems like they weren't strong enough if one lowly Hu'Mon could take them out with his bare hands lol.

What the heck is an "arse?"

Anyway, the only way I can see rationalizing Sisko or any other Human kicking their ASS is that The Founders were forced to make compromises in their genetic design. Perhaps the ability to rapidly grow them limited how strong they could be - and they are plenty strong enough to overcome most anyway.

 

[Myasishchev]

Anyone else think they were made a bit too strong?

They don't sleep, eat and only need white to live.

That part of the Jem'Hadar mythos is a little goofy. It's like that bit in MST3K where they meet the Observers--brain guys--and the Observers go on and on about how we are unto an amoeba, and they have evolved beyond bodies and food, although they have bodies (which unnecessarily carry their brains in pans) and they have nutritive pills (which bear a surprising resemblance to cereal and which an Observer must consume four or five bowls of per day).

The difference being that MST3K played this for laughs, whereas DS9 expected us to take it seriously. Either they're running on fusion, or white has calories in it, which means they do need food.

Also, the no sleep thing is deeply suspect. A great deal of neural rewiring goes on while we're unconscious, and probably cannot be undertaken in a conscious, active, perceiving mental state. If it could, animals wouldn't sleep, because sleep is dangerous and in many ways maladaptive. But sleep we do. If they wanted this to be more grounded, they could have had the Jemmies be split-brained and capable of resting one hemisphere at a time, which a variety of animals can do.

They have no sense of morality, other than what it takes to achieve victory.

They kinda did. They were deeply religious and were capable of respecting other warriors. In any event, I liked this part, since the Jemmies were more or less Klingons, perfected, and without all that Klingon nonsense that made their culture so profoundly lame.

They can even cloak!

This is of course preposterous. If it were an optical camouflage suit, I could buy it, but they went and made it biological. Fine, chromatophores can provide profoundly good optical camo. But then they gave them clothes. And guns. Which also shroud.

They could have even done the guns; there could have been body cavities designed in them to hide weapons while shrouding. But what were the clothes for?

Defense? Nothing's apparent, and any thermal or ballistic fabric could plausibly be built in.

Modesty? Why? They say he but it's pretty clear that it is the correct pronoun. Dudes don't have dicks.

I mean, the only thing they were missing were probably inbuilt rocket lasers.

That would've been sweet.

So, I don't agree that they were too strong,* since none of what they could do was particularly special, but they should have given more thought to plausibility of it all, since there were more plausible solutions to every problem I've raised.

*The Founders, however, were overpowered almost to the point of being broken. When a species is bound by neither entropy nor conservation of mass and energy, you know you're in trouble--I mean, I'd worship them as gods, and so would you, if you knew what was good for you.

 

[DevilEyes]

Anyone else think they were made a bit too strong?

They don't sleep, eat and only need white to live. They have no sense of morality, other than what it takes to achieve victory. They can even cloak!

I mean, the only thing they were missing were probably inbuilt rocket lasers.

I wouldn't say they were too strong.... I seen plenty get their arse kicked and Sisko beat the crap out of a number of them when they boarded the Defiant until they cut to another scene if I remember correctly..... seems like they weren't strong enough if one lowly Hu'Mon could take them out with his bare hands lol.

What the heck is an "arse?"

http://electricpulp.com/guykawasaki/arse/

Anyway, the only way I can see rationalizing Sisko or any other Human kicking their ASS...

Sisko kicked their donkey?

 

[neozeks]

Anyone else think they were made a bit too strong?

They don't sleep, eat and only need white to live.

That part of the Jem'Hadar mythos is a little goofy...

Eh, I've always took it as 'don't sleep and eat in ways that would normally be considered eating and sleeping by other species'. I doubt most people consider infusion 'eating'. And I think the Jems can indeed eat - otherwise I have no idea how Goran'Agar survived without his white. It's just not their prefered method of getting nutrients.

 

[Kegg]

Broadly speaking? ...no.

The Dominion's m.o. from a story-telling perspective is a Big Bad that poses a major threat not only to the Federation but the entire Alpha Quadrant. For that to work they need to have a pretty menacing, effective means at their disposal. The Jem'Hadar are the bulk of those means, and they worked as the orcs to the Founder's Sauron, if you'll forgive a meaningless and poorly inserted Lord of the Rings analogy.

Now allow me to try and address issues of science I do not understand, using my inept semi-logical brain!

Either they're running on fusion, or white has calories in it, which means they do need food.

Fusion. Or something. Consider Goran'Agar, who was born with an anomaly that prevented him from needing the white. There's no suggestion he ate at all, or thought about weening his soldiers onto food, which implies yeah, they don't eat.

Since they're genetically engineered, maybe their own bodies work on some sort of stillsuit principle, internally creating the energy needed to be used... yeah a very weak incoherent half-argument but again, science is a weird and unfamiliar terrain.

Also, the no sleep thing is deeply suspect. A great deal of neural rewiring goes on while we're unconscious, and probably cannot be undertaken in a conscious, active, perceiving mental state.

... genetic engineering. It found a way around that problem... somehow, allowing the rewiring to occur when conscious. Perhaps the state of constant sleeplessness is very, very painful. I don't know.

]This is of course preposterous. If it were an optical camouflage suit, I could buy it, but they went and made it biological. Fine, chromatophores can provide profoundly good optical camo. But then they gave them clothes. And guns. Which also shroud.

Um...

Yeah this one is hard to justify. The only thing working in its favour is that the cloaking is, again, engineered, so maybe instead of a chameoleon effect it's literally a biological cloaking device; built-in biotechnology.

But what were the clothes for?

Religious and discipline purposes? Everything about the Jem'Hadar culture lenas them towards discipline and obedience, and the clothes might be intended to have an additional psychological effect for the wearers. Maybe these are the vestments of the chosen of the Founders, the warriors who do their will.

 

[StarryEyed]

http://electricpulp.com/guykawasaki/arse/

Sorry, but I only scored 6. That does put me in the borderline asshole range but barely.

 

[Marie1]

Anyone else think they were made a bit too strong?

They don't sleep, eat and only need white to live. They have no sense of morality, other than what it takes to achieve victory. They can even cloak!

I mean, the only thing they were missing were probably inbuilt rocket lasers.

Holy cow!!!! "inbuilt rocket lasers"???????????

That's so awesomeeeeee!!!!

I want!!

But in answer to the question, I don't think they were.

 

[Praxius]

What the heck is an "arse?"

Canadian/British/Irish/Scottish/Australian term for ass.... Arse is used more in Atlantic Canada compared to the rest of Canada, as far as I understand.

Anyway, the only way I can see rationalizing Sisko or any other Human kicking their ASS is that The Founders were forced to make compromises in their genetic design. Perhaps the ability to rapidly grow them limited how strong they could be - and they are plenty strong enough to overcome most anyway.

As I see it, rationally speaking, is that when they first encountered the JD's, they knew very little about them, their abilities or their tactics.... eventually, as Star Trek's continual subliminal messages about Humanity, Humans/etc. learned to adapt, know their weaknesses, and counter them. Meanwhile the JD"s kept pretty much the same mentality, the same tactics, up until they made the Alphas, which didn't seem to do much better and had very little experience under their belt, thus not unstoppable.

The JD's were the Dominion's best assault force above all other species they had at their disposal. They were so valued by the Founders, because they could control them and they'd do anything they say, not to mention they would always sacrifice themselves to save a founder.

They were bred for war, but they were not invincible.... if anything, compare them to a Green Barret all hyped up on steroids and born and raised through war..... they'd be tough, but they can still be shot and stabbed and still be killed. And they can still be beaten in hand to hand combat at times.

Genetically modified soldiers can be very loyal and very deadly, but that doesn't mean they're unstoppable or can not be defeated.

The only real reason why they had any view of being unstoppable was because they could be quickly and for the most part, easily reproducible. Destroy their reproduction and eventually you can wipe them out.

 

[Queen Mab]

Anyone else think they were made a bit too strong?

They don't sleep, eat and only need white to live. They have no sense of morality, other than what it takes to achieve victory. They can even cloak!

I mean, the only thing they were missing were probably inbuilt rocket lasers.

I wouldn't say they were too strong.... I seen plenty get their arse kicked and Sisko beat the crap out of a number of them when they boarded the Defiant until they cut to another scene if I remember correctly..... seems like they weren't strong enough if one lowly Hu'Mon could take them out with his bare hands lol.

What the heck is an "arse?"

.

Fuck Me..

Actually learn about the world.. you do have access to the internet.

Google it.. rather then then asking/berating/complaining about other (and imo better) words..

 

[Temis the Vorta]

The Jem'hadar also had some interesting weaknesses: they didn't seem to be all that great with creative, adaptive thinking (I envision them being evolved from some kind of cattle - there's something herbivorous about them) and their dependence on one food source (which is what k-white was - it's not a "drug" - if they have other food sources, then k-white still contains a nutrient vital to their existence) is a major problem.

All an enemy needs to do is cut off that supply and your army is doomed. Other species, including ones you might be at war with, can live off the land on many planets, so you've given your army a big disadvantage. Since the Jems had an innate loyalty to the Founders, the k-white dependence was either an accident the Founders couldn't figure out how to solve, or it was solely to keep the Jems loyal to the Vorta. But then you have to wonder, why not evolve more intelligent, creatively-thinking Jems to take the role of Vortas? Why not instill blind loyalty to the Vortas as well as the Founders? Seems like a very clumsy way of setting up your army.

It may all come down to the Founders' paranoia. They wanted double control of the Jems, they didn't want the Jems to be loyal to anyone but them, they wanted there to always be a dangerous rift between the Jems and Vorta, whose personalities were so divergent that trouble was inevitable. They weren't trusting enough to invent a more sensible, streamlined system.

 

[ProtoAvatar]

The jem'hadar too strong?

The thing they were best at seemed to be...dying.
Either by the hands of their opponents (given equal numbers, they always seemed to loose the engagements) or in suicide attacks (which seemed to be their most effective tactic).