I recall reading somewhere (probably the TNG Companion, or Star Trek: The Continuing Mission) that early in TNG's development, it was suggested that they drop the Enterprise and just beam from a home base to this week's planet.
From Cracked: Transwarp beaming makes starships obsolete!
- Thread starter bryce
- Start date
Most of this has been mentioned: the technology could have severe range limitations, and you want to know where you're beaming to the first time you do it, so it wouldn't be the best way to explore the frontier.
Also, we've seen how often a planetary atmosphere or a space anomaly or the composition of some rocks have negatively impacted any and all transporter beams, that's a pretty severe limitation right there. Starfleet would still need star ships, even if it became practical to use long range transporters within a solar system or between close systems.
Also, we've seen how often a planetary atmosphere or a space anomaly or the composition of some rocks have negatively impacted any and all transporter beams, that's a pretty severe limitation right there. Starfleet would still need star ships, even if it became practical to use long range transporters within a solar system or between close systems.
Ah yes, but that's circular logic, isn't it?
The producers have ignored the logical implications of the existence of transporters since the first episode of Star Trek, so this is nothing new.
The best thing for the new producers to do is to ignore it all, because when Roddenberry and company did decide to open that particular can of worms just a tiny bit - introducing "replicators" in TNG - they just underscored how ridiculously out of sync this kind of control over matter is with everything else done in the Trek continuity. Transporters/replicators are the equivalent of Columbus texting Queen Isabella that he thinks he's reached India.
The best thing for the new producers to do is to ignore it all, because when Roddenberry and company did decide to open that particular can of worms just a tiny bit - introducing "replicators" in TNG - they just underscored how ridiculously out of sync this kind of control over matter is with everything else done in the Trek continuity. Transporters/replicators are the equivalent of Columbus texting Queen Isabella that he thinks he's reached India.
Why the heck do people 'assume' that new exploration is to be done on new planets alone?
Please.
Most of the exploration is conducted in deep space, by observing numerous stellar phenomena and not just encountering new civilizations.
This is something that's been established throughout various Trek shows.
To have your 'adventures' be set on 'planet of the week' would end up rather boring for me.
I much prefer stellar phenomena exploration, plus aspects of the universe from 'where no man has gone before'.
That's the kind of exploration that you cannot really do with transwarp beaming.
Unless you decide to transport the full ship and it's contents to a specific location and let it do it's thing.
TW beaming can be very effective and useful, however I do not see it replacing starships anytime soon.
Furthermore... we have to take into account it's range (given it's TW beaming, my thought would be that it would only be a matter of time before the signal can reach the destination and then you can materialize whatever it is you sent there), whether or not it can penetrate shields, etc.
It's quite possible the TW beaming would in effect have an extremely long range and would be on par if not better than what the Dominion demonstrated, or for example the 'translocator' that Voyager encountered (still that was just a transporter with a range of over 10Ly's ... with capacity for transport diminishing the farther away the signal goes).
It's possible that TW beaming as such would go around all those limitations (even shields - at least at first).
But beyond beaming your away teams to distant planets, if you'd eliminate ships, you'd be stuck on the planet itself (which seems stupid if humanity is about space exploration and not planet exploration).
Please.
Most of the exploration is conducted in deep space, by observing numerous stellar phenomena and not just encountering new civilizations.
This is something that's been established throughout various Trek shows.
To have your 'adventures' be set on 'planet of the week' would end up rather boring for me.
I much prefer stellar phenomena exploration, plus aspects of the universe from 'where no man has gone before'.
That's the kind of exploration that you cannot really do with transwarp beaming.
Unless you decide to transport the full ship and it's contents to a specific location and let it do it's thing.
TW beaming can be very effective and useful, however I do not see it replacing starships anytime soon.
Furthermore... we have to take into account it's range (given it's TW beaming, my thought would be that it would only be a matter of time before the signal can reach the destination and then you can materialize whatever it is you sent there), whether or not it can penetrate shields, etc.
It's quite possible the TW beaming would in effect have an extremely long range and would be on par if not better than what the Dominion demonstrated, or for example the 'translocator' that Voyager encountered (still that was just a transporter with a range of over 10Ly's ... with capacity for transport diminishing the farther away the signal goes).
It's possible that TW beaming as such would go around all those limitations (even shields - at least at first).
But beyond beaming your away teams to distant planets, if you'd eliminate ships, you'd be stuck on the planet itself (which seems stupid if humanity is about space exploration and not planet exploration).
You could always beam to an arbitrary location in a vessel that protects you from the elements (or lack thereof), but isn't burdened with the complicated gear needed to turn her into a "proper starship" with FTL drives and whatnot. The Stargate system was mainly built for planet-to-planet transportation, probably for the benefit of primitive cultures (every aspect of the system was carefully barbarian-proofed, after all), but was also utilized for deploying simple spacecraft in SG:Atlantis.
Or you could simply use the transporter as a long-reaching realtime subspace telescope and beam back images, without the need to send any hardware. That'd be a fairly small adjustment to the operating principles, I guess.
Timo Saloniemi
Or you could simply use the transporter as a long-reaching realtime subspace telescope and beam back images, without the need to send any hardware. That'd be a fairly small adjustment to the operating principles, I guess.
Timo Saloniemi
^ If anything, it would serve as a fitting explanation for why starships never visit the same planet twice.
...Although a much bigger plot problem tends to arise when our heroes refer to a previous starship visit. That visit is then typically made to look so incompetent that it becomes implausible that Starfleet would have survived long enough to launch the second, more heroic mission!
Timo Saloniemi
Timo Saloniemi
It would require a particle carrier wave that has no concern for lt. speed. You would then have acouple seconds of workability. The laws of the universe must be observed!
Well, the ordinary transporter is based on the ability to defy some of those laws (say, the uncertainty principle) for minutes at a stretch - and sometimes for decades.
Range doesn't seem like an obvious showstopper for transporter technology, and indeed we already know that transporters with a range of thousands of lightyears are quite possible. One of those technologies was even compatible with the regular TOS transporters in "Assignment: Earth"! A device with a range of a few lightyears is quite within the grasp of 24th century technology, and 23rd might manage it with a little helpful nudging in the right direction. Perhaps the only thing keeping starships in service is the natural inertia of the arch-conservative Starfleet?
Timo Saloniemi
Range doesn't seem like an obvious showstopper for transporter technology, and indeed we already know that transporters with a range of thousands of lightyears are quite possible. One of those technologies was even compatible with the regular TOS transporters in "Assignment: Earth"! A device with a range of a few lightyears is quite within the grasp of 24th century technology, and 23rd might manage it with a little helpful nudging in the right direction. Perhaps the only thing keeping starships in service is the natural inertia of the arch-conservative Starfleet?
Timo Saloniemi
Mind you, even subspace communications are not instantaneous. I don't think that very, very long subspace transporter ranges are doable with Federation levels of technology. They can't maintain an ACB for longer than a few minutes at best. As with Voyager, it's likely that longer range transporters are going to require massive amounts of energy and be incompatible with standard tech.
The thing is, there doesn't appear to be any R&D concentrating on making such techniques more practicable and affordable. Is that only because we are not looking in the right places, or is Starfleet opposed to such development? And is the opposition based on valid or invalid arguments?
Interstellar transporters aren't a novel technology in TNG: Kirk encountered those fairly regularly. They should be the target of much research, and some of the alien devices might actually be accessible for study. Say, those of Triskelion.
Timo Saloniemi
Interstellar transporters aren't a novel technology in TNG: Kirk encountered those fairly regularly. They should be the target of much research, and some of the alien devices might actually be accessible for study. Say, those of Triskelion.
Timo Saloniemi
